;^^0F Pfti-Cfj^x^ I — '• i V z Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2009 with funding from Princeton Theological Seminary Library http://www.archive.org/details/universalist02lond THE ft UNIVERSALIS!. VOL. I. , LONDON : H. K. LEWIS, 15, GOWER STREET, NORTH. NEW YORK : HALLOCK & LYON. BOSTON : T. WHITTEMORE. 1850. LONDON : PRINTED BY H. K. LEWIS, GOWER STREET NORTH. PREFACE. We were once conversing with a pious member of the Church of England on the many lamentable causes and deplorable results of those sectarian distinctions which obtain among the professed followers of the Lamb. We deprecated those divisions of which denominational distinctions were the deliberate and public avowal ; of which many were the result of a difference of opinion of the utmost, sometimes almost ludicrous insignificance, when compared with those momentous principles by which they both still professed to be actuated. But so it is ; and here we have another illustration of the proverb, " they strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel." Our church of England friend reciprocated our sentiment ; and lamented, as we do, the narrowing influence thus exerted over the heart, an influence which is one of the first fruits of such divisions. We were right in our conjecture, that the title of our magazine was a designation our worthy friend had never thought of in connection with religion and theology ; and, when we frankly told him we were Universalists, he looked thoughtful and exclaimed, " I like that term !" Not that it conveyed to him all that we associate with it ; but by it were suggested principles in which his Christian charity and generous spirit fully sympathized — principles which, in their proper development and final results, embody our highest aspirations, and confirm our most holy faith. To maintain, on the one hand, that we are not the advocates of party — that our object is unsectarian ; and to assert, on the other, a distinct individuality by the assumption of an appellative which must dis- tinguish us from any and all ecclesiastical bodies, may appear somewhat paradoxical. We observe, and we are anxious to be understood, that since a magazine, such as that with whose interests we have the honor to be identified, must have a name to distinguish it from others of the same species, just as the writer nuist have a name to distinguish him from other men, that name was adopted which should most honestly, and most accurately express or suggest the principles we designed to advocate. And, so far from proposing to ourselves another addition to those ecclesiastical bodies, of which, as such, the New Testament knows nothing whatever, and to which we believe the Scriptures to be opposed, we have been anxious, and take this opportunity seriously to protest, against any such design. And it is a satisfaction to us to know, that, among our contributors and subscribers, there are members of various communities — Christians of different denominations. Our great object is sufficiently made known in the pages of the volume which we now have the pleasure to present to our readers. And we verily believe, that the errors which we oppose are as much the cause and fuel of those divisions which disgrace the Christian world, as the truths for which it is our privilege to contend are antagonistic to the spirit of sectarianism and party. We do not say that all differences of opinion must vanish upon a reception of the doctrine of Universalism ; but we do hold that, while those differences may, nay must be materially lessoned, they will not, because they will have no power to diminish that charity which, linked to the throne of the Eternal, embraces all into whom God has "breathed the breath of life." If Universalists, however, because they are Universalists, are to be cast out of the synagogue, as has been the case in instances which have come to our knowledge, their opponents must not charge them with sectarianism, if they meet together for mutual edification, and the worship of the great Father of all. We have been accused of the undignified procedure of giving "nick- names," because we have sometimes used the term " Partialist" in contradistinction to Universalist. We can sincerely say that we never intended any disrespect towards those from whom we differed ; and that the use of the term has been resorted to as a simple matter of convenience ; just as the designation we have given ourselves best expresses the sentiment which we advocate. It is the regular converse suggested by avowed opposition ; and was in use, moreover, long before we adopted it. We cannot allow this opportunity to pass without congratulatirig our friends and ourselves upon the present position and cheering prospects of The Universalist. Considering the fewness of those who openly defend Universalism — the difficulty of securing publicity for a new periodical, — the few facilities at our command for obtaining an exten- sive circulation — the opposition with which we have had to contend — our best wishes and largest expectations have been more than realized. We thank our friends, one and all, for the support and sympathy, the kindly-tendered counsel and forbearance, which we have received at their hands. We thank God, and take courage. No inaterial alteration will be made in the conduct of The Univer- salist. A greater variety and wider range of subjects may be intoduced, and a more popular style of treatment may be desirable : these we will endeavour to secure. We propose to commence, in our next volume, an examination, in as plain a style as possible, in order that the unlearned reader may have an opportunity of examining and deciding for himself, all the passages in the Old and New Testaments which are supposed to teach, or imply, the doctrine of eternal torments. The Universalist will thus constitute a complete dictionary on the subject. Our undertaking would be materially assisted, and our principles more widely diffused, if those who have the means and the opportunity would order one or more copies of each number, in addition to the copy they require for themselves, for gratuitous distribution. Thanks to those who have hitherto kindly acted upon this suggestion. London, Dec. 1850. CONTENTS. Mission — Brief Sketch of the Recent Progress of Universalism. By the Rev, David Thorn, D.D., Ph. D Cherubim, on the Correspondence. Anecdotes against Universalism and the Christian Witness Granville Penn on 1 Tim. iii 15—17, by Dr. Thorn Judicial Oaths ........ Mr. H. Clarke, the dismissed agent of the London City Meeting at Richmond On the Establishment of the Universalist . Relly and his congregation, by Dr. Thom On Acts xii. 4 On proclaiming Universahsm to the World — reply to Dr. Thorn', objection, by Anetazo .....'.. Query by Amor Veritatis ...... I Reply to, by Veritas Amoris and Anetazo Rev. Ridley Herschell and the Exhibition of 1851 Scott's Commentary The Word KCtra^yurai ...... " The Heresy of Universalism," by W. C. Boardman Remarks on by Censor, and L, F. J. . ; The authorized translation of the Scriptures . " Telling Anecdotes " — by Nohdorn The origin of the doctrine of Hell Torments . Christian Precepts the Mirror of God's Character . Dark side of the Gospel . ...... Dealings of God with mankind : cotemporaneous, successive, Doctrine of Endless Misery in the church of England Dr. Tholuck and the prospectus of the Universalist Duration of the Universe . Election and Universal Salvation ..... English Universalist's Reading Society, Octagon, Plymouth Eternal Torments and the Constitution of Man Examination of Blomfield's Notes on Rom. v. . of Luke XX. 27—38 .... Explanation of the terms and phrases supposed to express the place or punishment of Endless Torment in the next life Extracts. Bishop Newton's Writings ..... Dr Phillip Nicholas Shuttleworth .... Edward Cock's " Man and his Maker '' John Foster's Life and Correspondence Lyell's Visit to the United States .... Sir J. Stephen's Essays in Ecclesiastical Biography . Southey's Life of Wesley ..... Figurative Language of Scripture .... Corn or Grain ....... The Sabbath First Principles ....... How they propagate liberal doctrines in Italy Is faith, or believing, essential to Salvation? Jean Frederic Oberlin's Glimpse of Universal Salvation Jeremiah White London Thieves and City Mission 4 196 71 192 47, 72 and final 104 23 24 168 284 212 235 260 143 104 120 144 142 211 259 244 222 13 268 249 145 204 118 185 25 11 169 151 71 70,80 27, 101 177 9 186 199 240 219 206 210 184 119 77, 193, 237 224 Miscellanea 156, 187 Natural Religion 210 Observations submitted to the Consideration of Partialists ... 16 On being Wise above what is Written ....... 270 On 1 Cor. XV. 24—28 121 On 1 John ii. 2 .155 On Matthew v. 44, 45 167 On Matthew xvi. 9 . 250 On the Hebrew and Greek Words translated " Curse "... 148 On the Words Alim and Aiamis 49 Paddle-Box 128 Paul a Heretic • . . . 208 Phraseology of Scripture 19 Poetry A Word to the Elect, By Acton Bell 135 By a Universalist 82 By Alfred Tennyson 271 From Southey 70 On Matthew xviii. 21 157 Peace as a River .......... 211 The Voiceless Voice, By George Hop«all ...... 82 The Saviour's Love, By Alfred Olifant 157 What is it? By A. C. Thomas 247 Professor Stuart's Difficulties . . . . . . . . 153 Questions well asked .......... 209 Reviews. Albertus Magnus' treatise [1193—1280] 190 AH prophecy fulfilled 191 Divine Inversion. By David Thorn, D.D. Ph.D 188 Dr. Thorn and his Works. The Number and Names of the Apocalyptic Beasts ............ 65 Exposition of the Ninth Chapter of Paul's Epistle to the Romans. By James Morrison ......... 167 Ireland as I saw it. By W. S. Balch 226, 250 Saci-amental Religion subversive of Vital Christianity. By the Rev. W. Brock 283 Shem, Ham, and Japheth. By Peter Hately Waddell . . .139 The Soul : lier Sorrows and her Aspirations. By Francis William Newman . . 39, 58, 83 The Great Redemption : an Essay on the Mediatorial System. By William Leask 46 The Doctrine of a Future State. By William Gibson Humphrey, B.D. 141 The Millennium. By George Galloway 271 The Ultimate Manifestation of God to the World. By David Waldie 161 Three Questions Proposed and Answered. By David Thorn, D.D., Ph.D. 135 Religion and Insanity .......... 207 Rule of Criticism 250 Scripture Parallelism .....*.... 55 Second Coming of Christ, and the Resurrection of the Dead . . 106 Summary of " An Inquiry iiito the Nature, Progress, and End of Prophecy." By Samuel Lee, D.D 20,34,113 Thoughts for the Thoughtful 67 The Scriptures turned upside down by Modern Limitarians ... 98 The Tree known by its Fruits 23 Trinity, on tlic . . . . . . . . • . .180 True Christianity a Practical Religion . . . 52, 125, 171, 213, 261 Univcrsalism the Comforter ......... 208 Was St. Paul a Universalist? 248 What is Univcrsalism ? 1 thp: UNIVERSALIST. VOL. II. LONDON : H. K. LEWIS, 15, GOWER STREET, NORTH. NEW YORK : HALLOCK & LYON. BOSTON ; T. WHITTEMOHE.) 1852. LONDON : PRINTED BY H. K. LEWIS, GOWER STREET NORTH. PUEFACE. The Universalis!" originated in a desire to promote the discussion and diffusion of those views of the Deity — his will, his nature, and his works, which the existing periodical literature of our country not only failed to represent hut to which it was generally opposed. It was suggested that a medium of intercommunication among Christians who believed in the universality of God's love and the divine efficacy and all-sufficiency of the atonement of the Lord Jesus, might be con- ducive to their mutual knowledge, edification, and comfort, and that such a periodical might be the means of drawing the attention of others to those Scriptures through which we have been led to rejoice in the Lamb of God that taketli away the sin of the world. In this and the preceding volume we have attempted, however imjierfectly, to realize these objects. The defenders of the doctrine of Universalism have not, during any period of the Church's history, been numerous. Only here and there and at distant intervals, over the gloom and darkness by which " Christendom" has been enshrouded has light gleamed forth on this subject. God has never, probably, left himself entirely without wit- ness. As in nature he is ever testifying to the universality of his pro- vidence, so by his word and through his servants has he been witness- ing to the universality of his grace. In the past and during the present century various works have appeared on the doctrine in these realms. To the attention of our readers many of these (including nearly all that has been written during the last few years) have been commended, and to us this circumstance is a source of gratification ; for, through our labors many have been made acquainted with the productions of writers which would otherwise have remained unknown. It is to be regretted that some of the ablest treatises on Universalism, such as Stonhouse, Chauncy, Relly, Douglas, and others, should by their scarceness, rarely be met with.* * We are glad that our friend, Dr. Thorn, — fully alive to this want — has recently published in the " Universalist's Library," an edition of Jeremiah White's admirable work. We would respectfully urge upon him the desirableness of a continuance of his efforts, and trust that he ■will be amply sustained by the support and encouragement of all who know and love the truth. IV. We are deeply sensible of the kindness of those friends who have' assisted us by their free will contributions Physical infirmities have deprived us of the continued assistance of one venerable, pious, and learned friend. (May his declining sun be the serene and peaceful calm of a dav whose burden and heat he has borne with cheerfulness, couiage, and self-denial.) The hand of death has separated us from another by whose gentle and friendly voice we have been encouraged, and by whose cultivated pen our pages have been adorned. To the Rev. David Thorn, D.D, Ph.D, we are placed under lasting obligations ; who, although unpledged for a single article, has been among the most strenuous of our friends, and has rendered essential service at the sacrifice of much valuable time, personal comfort, and, we fear, some- times health. May this noble champion of the truth be yet permitted to wield the sword of the spirit with continued energy and increasing success. We could name many more who have wilh thorough disin- terestedness placed at our disposal papers of much interest and value. But space forbids. We tender to all our best and most grateful acknowledgments. Universalism is, with us, no human speculation, nor is it a mere sentiment. It is not a figment of our own brain, nor the mere wish of a generous heart. It is a fact — an absolute certainty — an uncontingent truth, divinely oi-iginated and divinely revealed. We may search for it in vain among human creeds; we may despair of finding any corre- soonding sympathy wath it in the earthly, sensual, and devilish mind of man. But as true as God is love — it is ; as true as Jesus is the Saviour of all men — it is : as true as the whole creation (/roans — it shall be delivered. As true as Christians now behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, shall that glory be revealed that all flesh may see it together. We rejoice in the fact, and would realize more than we have ever yet done the divine and heavenly principles by which it is to be finally consummated. As it is not of human origin, so neither does its realization depend upon human efforts. We seek to draw the attention of our fellow mortals to the truth — it is well : we are no longer permitted to do so — it is still well. Human agency is nothing. Man, even in relation to inferior things, is less than nothing and vanity — towards the realiza- tion of Heaven's high purpose infinitely less than nothing. All flesh is grass : the grass wilhereth, the floiver fadeth, cut the word of THE LORD ENDURETH FOR EVER. CONTENTS. irist ? . 215 • 233, 257 . 51 198 . 199 . 217 . 52 104 . . 347 . 48 165 An Answer to the Question, Why is not the Pope the Antichrist ? y An Autobiography ....... Anecdotes, Kindness the best punishment .... Home-made Scripture ..... The people or the devil — which shall be destroyed? For the Social Circle ..... Another awful Suicide ...... Apostolic Gospel and Universalisni .... \Biography of the Rev. Neil Douglas, M. A. "Christian Treasiuy" arid "the Dying Universalist" Christian's ground of Assurance .... Correspondence 16, 135, 136, 149, 184, 199 Should the doctrine of Universal Salvation be proclaimed to tlie world?. 29, 53, 87, 118 The Second Death - 240 Apostolic Gospel . . . . . . . . .261 Deus Volens ........... 101 Does the word Hell in ihe Old Testament mean a place or state of end- less suffering ........... 236 Extract from Samuel Thomson's Life and Discoveries . , . Ill Experience of a mind in searcli after truth . . . . . .188 Figurative Languge of Scripture Deer , 197 Pastoral Imagas ....... ... 8 Free Church and all other professing Christian Churches . . 189 Great Exhibition 144 Hell of Christendom and Hell of Heathendom identified, and compared with the Hell of Scripture 137.161 Important Concessions of Professor Stuart ...... 50 7 John Thom, by his son David Thorn, D.D., Ph. D. . . . 71,112 Literary Evening with Dr. Thom of Liverpool by a Doctor of the Uni- versity of Heildelberg ......... 6 Mary Martha Sherwood 339 Man and Law 182 Mr. William Upjohn 364 Mission to England — One Thouaaud Dollars ojfered .... 267 Opinions of the Fathers ......... 338 Peace on Earth .......... 185 Plain Questions to plain men on the Sovereignty of God . . , 168 Port Natal 25, 46 Priestcraft ........... .51 " Primitive Church Magazine'' and Eternal Punishment . . 128, 146 Poetry " Go, and sin no more." ........ 335 The Grave of the Suicide ........ 216 God is Love 216 The Spiritual Ministry ........ 240 Reviews Acts of the EUlers ......... 227 Biden's Tine Church 331 Bond's Baptismal Ke^encviition ....... 151 Candlish's Cross of Christ 314 Chapiu on the Lord's Prayer . ...... 172 Chapin's Hours of Communion ....... 172 Conversation between an Endless Damnationist and a Universalist 179 Cock's Infidel 55 Drummond's Speech ......... 157 Election no excuse for man's sin ...... 32 Elements of Catholic Philosophy ....... 274 Fawcett's '• Few 'I'houghts" and " Gi-oaning Creation" . . 150 Gilfillan's Galleries of Literary Portraits ..... 294 Figgin's Power of the keys ........ 156 Hob'os' Maranatha 323 Hunt's One Faith of the Gospel ...... 63 James's Farewell Address ........ 159 Martineau and Atkinson's law of man's nature and developement 2"9 M'Neile's world tliat shall be, or the Good time t'liat's coming . 151 Map of the purpose and duration of the reign of Ciu'ist . . 89 Holler's Christian Doctrine of Future Punishment . . . 363 Nine Letters between A. G. M. and N. B 230 Oakeshott's Berean's Strictures ....... 225 Price's Study of Languages ........ 62 Kelly's Ministry of the New 'I'estament . . , . . 268 Reasons why Christians believe in the doctrine of Universal Salvation 158 Seabrook's Millenninm ........ 89 Some first principles of a Clu'istian Faith ..... 203 Stark's Letter to Wiseman . . . . . . . 154 Thorn's Whv is Poperv progressing ? . . , . . .14 Three Grand Exhibitions 218,241 Roe's Analytical Arrangement of the Holy Scriptures . . . 245 Le Rccueile Catholique. — Cases of Conscience .... 255 Waddell's Faith and tlie Evidences ...... 158 Religious opinions of William Pitt ....... 290 Rev. Dr. Thorn, of Liverpool ........ 364 Rev. Walter Balfour 110 Scripture Illustration Gen. ii. 7 — The Immortality of the Soul . . . . . 1 Deut. xxxii. 22, and Psalm ix. 17. . . . , . , 17 Story of Grace 11,21,83,237 Simony ............ 16!) Sir John Stonhouse and Universal Restoration . . . . .212 Sympathy of Jesus .... ...... 283 Tne Dying Universalist again ! . , . . . . . . 217 The Second Death .......... 336 'I'he True God known only as he has revealed his character in his Word 260 Unknown God, the 209 Universality of God's love to man . . . . . . . 2, 18 Universalism — Great objection to, and its answer . . . 41, 65 in Plymouth, &c 216 in Liverpool .......... 237 What is the Gospel? 214 What is Providence ? ......... 262 Word to Christians of Every Ciced . ... . . - 24 THE UNIVERSALIST JANUARY, 1851. ON GEN. II. 7.--THE IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL. I observed in the number for last March, p. 49, that " there are per- haps no instances in which the sense of Scripture is so much obscured as by the mistranslation of the words aiui and mayios, so much so, that to this cause the doctrine of endless torment is to be chiefly attributed." Nearly connected with this, and attended with similar results, is the general misconception relating to the immortality of the soul ; which, as supposed, is conferred on it, as a constituent of its nature by creation, and therefore indestructible by the most intense and unintermitting sufferings, and amid the total wreck of the material uni- verse. This, however, is not the doctrine of Scripture, but of heathen philosophy : witness the well-known soliloquy, which Addison puts into the mouth of Cato. " It must be so ; Plato, thou reasonest well," &c. It is also the common opinion, derived from the same corrupt source, that a suffering immortality will be the doom of the far greater part of mankind. But this, I say, is not the doctrine of Scripture, which, on the contrary, teaches that immortality is derived, not from creation, but from redemption — an immortality not of soul, but of a higher principle, — and, of necessity, a universal blessing, excluding all posthumous suf- fering, whether penal, purgatorial, or corrective. This will fully appear from a comparison of the principal texts relating to the subject, among which that stands first which records the creation of man. *' And the Lord God formed the man, dust of (or from) the ground ; and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul," — person, or animated frame. Gen. ii. 7. Air is thus the animating principle of all living bodies ; for " all have one breath." Eccles. iii. 19. In this there is an analogy between the habitation and the inhabitants : the former consisting of the heavens and the earth ; and the latter of breath derived from the heavens, and dust derived fom the earth. We also read thus in the prophet Ezekiel. " Then he said to me. Prophesy to the wind (margin, breath), son of man, and say to the wind. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live. So I prophesied, as he commanded me, and the breath came into VOL. I. ' B 2 ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF GOD S LOVE TO MAM. them, and they lived, and stood up on their feet, an exceeding great army." xxxvii. 9, 10. This vision exhibits a circumstantial enlargement of the process in Gen. ii. 7, and exemplifies nothing above the reception of mere animal life. Surely it exhibited to the prophet's view men of the same kind as Adam ; and yet it tells us of no animating principle beyond what came from " the' four winds." He then proceeds to show, in ver. 11 — 14, that this principle is the type of that higher spiritual life, which God bestows on his people ; and which is received only through the new creation in Christ. Paul also, to the same purpose, contrasts the soulical nature of Adam with the sphitual nature of Christ. " The first man, Adam, Avas made a living soul, the last Adam was made a quickening (or life-giving) spirit." 1 Cor. xv. 45. The former is soulical, and possessor of mere natural life ; the latter is spiritual, and sole possessor and giver of life and immortality. So far indeed is the Adamic nature from possessing immortality, that we inherit nothing from it but sin and death ; but, " as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." 1 Cor. xv. 22. Under every point of view, we see the falsehood of the popular opinion. " Cursed is the ground," says the original sentence, " for thy sake, in sorrow thou shalt eat of it all the days of thy life. Thonis also and thistles it shall bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herb of the field. In the sweat of thy face thou shalt eat bread, till thou return to the ground ; for out of it thou wast taken : for dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return." Gen. iii. 17 — 19. From this passage we learn, that the whole natural life is that which is sustained by natural food ; that the whole natural death consists in the dissolution of the body ; and hence this death does not lead to suffering, but that suffering leads to and terminates in death. Divine philanthropy (Tit. iii. 4.) has thus appointed the present earthly sinful, suffering, and transitory life, to enhance the value of that which is heavenly, holy, happy, and endless. Hence the call of the Psalmist to universal praise and thanksgiving — " Let everything that hath breath praise Jehovah." Ps. cl. 6, — a call, to which the beloved disciple witnessed, in vision, a universal response : " Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing. And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, for ever and ever. Rev. v. 12, 13. R. R. ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF GOD'S LOVE TO MAN. God lias given to us a revelation, in which he reveals himself as a God of Light (1 John i. 5), and by wliicli it is manifest, that God is love (1 John iv. 8), by our minds being illuminated by that same power which said, "Let there be light, and there was light" (Gen. i. 3) ; for whatever makes manifest is light. Eph. v. 13. It is only by natural light, that we are eiuiblcd to see natural things ; and it is only by spiritual light, that we can know anything of spiritual things. ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF GOD S LOVE TO MAN. 3 Man by his nature is opposed to God (Roui. viii. 7, Eph. ii. 3), and it is only by the light of the Scriptures that he can know anything of himself as to what he really is; or of what God really is (Jer. xvii. 9, Matt. xi. 27, xvi. 17). By divine illumination he is given to know (2 Cor. iv, 6), that the light in him is but gross darkness (Matt. vi. 23); that his wisdom is not only foolishness but enmity to God (1 Cor. iii. 19, Rom. viii. 7) ; that he can in no degree testify of God; thai his reason cannot comprehend revelation (1 Cor. ii. 14); and that it is by faith only, he can know that God created the worlds, by the power of his word, and that because God himself hath said it (Heb. xi. 3, Ps, xxxiii. 6). Though man cannot testify of God, he by the Scriptures testifies unto man by Jesus Christ, that his love is the great cause of our existence; that it was his especial purpose, before time began, to manifest himself to us his creatures, as a God of Love (Eph. chap, iii.) ; by his creating the world (Is. xlv. 18), and more especially in his forming man, a being possessed of soul (1 Cor. xv. 45), whose fleshly mind is enmity to God, not subject to his law, nor able to be so (Rom. viii. 7); and yet a being made specially and expressly after the image and likeness of him (Gen. i, 27), the second man, the Lord from heaven (1 Cor. XV. 47), who in the beginning was the word, who was with God (John i. 1), and who was God made manifest in flesh (John i. 14) ; who was the first born of every creature (Col. i. 15); who created all things, and in whom and by whom all things exist (Col. i. 16, 17) ; and consequently a being destined by grace and the purpose of God, to be in due time conformed to his Maker, and enjoy him throughont eternity; not by being restored to the state that Adam originally had before his fall ; but by being newly created in Christ Jesus, by being put to death in his flesh, and quickened by his spirit, and consequently elevated to a state far superior to any that Adam could of himself, by any possibility have enjoyed. 1 Peter iii. 18. God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life only : and man became a living creature (Gen. ii. 7), and was therefore a proper subject to be placed under a negative and prohibitory law, which would iiave been impossible had he been possessed of real life itself, which is spii'it (which is God) because spirit knows no law, for law workelh death. Rom. chap. vii. Had man obeyed that negative aud prohibitory law which God addressed to him, " of all the trees in the garden thou mayst freely eat ; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof, dying thou slialt die'' (Gen. 2. 16, 17), he would have continued at the best but a fleshly minded man ; not only entirely ignorant of, but deprived of all immortality and life — which were brought to light only by Jesus Christ and his gospel (2 Tim. i. 10), which alone is th3 wisdom and the power of God unto salvation (Rom. i. 16, 1 Cor. i. 24), and would have realized at tlie most but a continuous animal existence. God displayed his love to man by issuing to Adam that prohibitory law, that he might shew the inability of man to abstain from violating even one prohibition, and that addressed merely to bis appetite: that by his act of dis- obedience he should incur death, and be prevented from taking hold of the Tree of Life himself — lest he should eat thereof and have lived for ever a guilty man (Gen. iii. 22); in order that God might then proclaim his love to him still further in the promise, that " I'he Seed of the woman should bruise the head of the serpent, through the bruising of his own heel (Gen. iii. 15) ; thus the law entered, that the offence might abound,that where the sin of the creature abounded, in the transgression of a single negative and fleshly law, the grace of the glorious Creator might much more abound, in the complete fulfilment of positive and divuie laws, by Jesus Christ, to the honour and glory of God, by him, humbling the creature and exalting the Saviour; in depriving the former of his natural life in order to bestow him 4 ON THE UNIVEKSALITY OF GOD S LOVE TO MAN. through the latter, eternal life as his gift ; by putting him to death with Christ in his flesh, to be quickened with Christ in his resurrection by his spirit. Rom. V. 20, 21 ; vi. 23 ; 1 Peter iii. 18. Adam was the source of all mankind ; and he, by disobedience to the first prohibition, brought into the world sin and death, and so death passed upon all men (Rom. v. 12) : for the whole human race sinned in Adam, lor they were all in him, and were possessed of the same common nature with him (Acts xvii. 26, Mai. ii. 10) : and consequently the whole world became guilty before God (Rom. iii. 19 — 22), who hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might liave mercy upon all (Rom. xi. 32); that the free gift of righteousness, might not be as the offence by the one (Adam) was, namely, sin and condemnation; but that it might be unto the justification of all men unto hfe, by the reigning of the righteousness of one, even Jesns Christ (Rom. v. 15 — 21) our Lord. Acts ii. 36. Adam had in him the seed of death; for he was made of the dust of the ground, and was destined to return to the ground as dust (Gen. iii. 19) ; he was tlie clay in tlie hands of the heavenly potter, who made him first a marred vessel of flesh and blood (Jer. xviii. 4); and as such he could not enter the kingdom oi heaven (1 Cor. xv. 50). In order to do so, he had to become changed — his natural body into heavenly body ; his natural mind into heavenly mind ; and this, by his undergoing death (1 Cor. xv. 53, 54), and by being newly created, and made a partaker of the resurrection state of Christ (Rom. xiv. 8, 9), with mind and body assimilated to him of whom Adam was the type, figure, and shadow, reflected by Christ Jesus the substance. Rom. v. 14. God executes all his threatenings, and fulfils all his promises. He caused the kingdom of God to be preached by John, until whose coming the law and the prophets were ; and as it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail (Luke xvi. 16, 17) ; therefore it is, that in due time the seed of the woman appeared. God took upon himself the natiure of man (Heb. ii. 14, 16) with sin attached — was born of a woman, and conse- quently was under the law, Gal. iv. 4. It behoved Christ to be born of a wo- man, in order to become subjected to law. He appeared iu the likeness of sinful flesh (Rom. viii. 3), but was sinless himself (1 Pet. ii. 22, Heb. iv. 15); and became emphatically the God-man, God with us. Mat. i. 23. The word was made flesh (John i. 14), to whom law was meat and drink, his meditation and delight (Ps. cxix. 97) ; for his whole life consisted in living in perfect obe- dience, in thought, word, and deed, to all God's statutes, judgments, and ordi- nances ; for he had the mind of God, by which he crucified the flesh, with its affections and lusts, Gal. v. 24, vi. 14. It was to Christ, the faithful and believing one, that all divine law was pro- perly addressed; and it behoved him to fulfil all law (Mat. v. 17, 18) ; and to be delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification (Rom. iv. 25) ; that all things might be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning him, Luke xxiv. 44 — 46. God having declared that the sacrifices of bulls and of goats satisfied him not Is. i. 11 — 14 ; and that it was impossible for their blood to take away sins (Heb. X. 4), and yet without blood'being shed there could be no remission of sins (Heb. ix. 22) ; provided himself a special sacrifice in his own well beloved son, who appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself Heb. ix. 26 ; and through the eternal Spirit, to offer himself without spot to God (Heb. ix. 14), to whom he saith that sacrifice and offering for sin thou wouldstnot (Ps. xl. 6), neither hadst thou pleasure therein (Heb. x. 8), ' Lo I come in the volume of the book it is written of me to do thy will O God " Heb. x. 7. In due time Clu-ist was to give himself a ransom for all (1 Tim. ii. 6) to die for the ungodly (Rom. v. 6). although he had obeyed every law positive and negative, that by dying and tasting death for every man (Heb. ii. 9) he might by this last act of obedience, destroy law by fulfilling it, and become the end of ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF GOD's LOVE TO MAN. 5 it for righteousness unto every one that beheveth (Rom. x. 4) ; and that he might by his being raised from the dead, and made perfect (Heb. v. 9), through the righteousness of his faith (Phil. iii. 9), bring in everlasting salvation to a guilty and condenmed world ; for God so loved the world, that he sent his only begotten Son into the world (1 Jo. iv. 9). to be the propitiation for its sins (1 John iv. 10), to die the just one (Acts iii. 14, vii. 52, xxii. 14), for the unjust (I Pet. iii. 18), that by his lifting him up and raising him from the dead (Acts ii. 24), the prince of this world should be cast out (John xii. 31). and all men be drawn to himself (John xii. 32), and be saved by the ressurrection life of Christ and know that which the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh (Rom. viii. 3). Christ himself did ; he put away sin for ever, through the offering of his body (Heb. x. 10); that the gospel might be there proclaimed. Be it known unto you men and brethren that by this man is the forgivenes of sins (Acts xiii. 38), whose name is called the Word of God (Rev. xix. 13), and whose testimony is the spirit of prophecy (Rev. xix. 10). As it is appointed unto all men once to die and after that its execution ; so Christ was once offered (Heb. ix. 27, 28) on the accursed tree, being made a eurse for us (Gal. iii. 13), that he might redeem us, the whole family of man, from the power of the law which is death ; and this he did on the cross when he cried it is finished (John xix. 30). He was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross ; therefore God hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name ; that at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess, that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God (Phil. ii. 8 — 11): tliis hath the Lord, the just God and Saviour, sworn by himself Is. xlv. 21—23. Christ was faith itself embodied (Heb. xl. 1, xii. 2) : he believed in God and therefore he knew his body would be redeemed from the power of the grave (Ps. xiix. 15), and his soul raised from hades the third day, and that God ■would receive him (Matt. xvi. 21). He died, he brought law to an end in himself by fulfilling it, and he made it honourable; he destroyed law also, by becoming the end of it, and thereby destroyed sin itself; for the strength of sin is the law (I Cor. XV. 56); and where no law is there is no transgression, Rom. iv. 15. He by his death reconciled a guilty world to God, and destroyed death in himself (2 Tim. i. 10). and him that had the power of death, that is the devil (Heb. ii. 14, Rev. xii. 9), he also underwent the punishment of hades and destroyed its power. Rev. xx. 13, 14. The death of Christ was introductory to his resurrection from the dead (John X. 17, 18, xii. 24, 25), and his ascension to his father. He had power to lay down his life and had power to take it up again ; no man took his life from him, he was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world (Rev. xiii. 8), the type and antitype of the slain female lamb (Lev. iv. 32), and of every Jewish sacrifice. In due time God raised his soul from Hades (Acts ii, 31), and did not suffer his body to see corruption (Acts xiii. 37) ; He rose from the dead triumphant over law, sin, death, and hades, leading captivity captive (Ps. Ixviii. 18, Eph. iv. 8), and was received into glory, 1 Tim. iii. 16. By his resurrection, he destroyed completely the power of the grave over the bodies of men ; and by destroying death, by undergoing hades, also destroyed its power over the souls of men (Hos. xiii. 14), and became an ocean of life to pour out his spirit upon all flesh, Joel ii. 28. In his resui-rection soul became deified, and body became glorified ; he ascended to heaven with glorified body and glorified mind, to sit for ever- more at the right hand of God, Mark xvi. 19. Heb. x. 12. As Christ's body was laid in a grave, in which no man had before lain (John xix. 41) ; so his death was one through which no man had ever before passed ; it was a death peculiar to himself, and in rising from that death, he became the first fruits of them that slept, 1 Cor. xv. 20. He died as the Son 6 A LITERARY EVENING WITH DR. TIIOM. of man, Mary being his mother ; he was raised from the dead as the Son of God, God being his father ; and it is Christ who liveth, and was dead and is alive for evermore, who has the keys of hades and of death (Rev. 1. 18). He ascended to his father and to om- fatlier, to his God and to our God (John xx. 17), and gave gifts unto men (Ps. Ixviii. 18), that where he is in spirit, we, all his creatures, ultimately may be also, John xvii. 24. Herein the wisdom of God is love to the world : for Christ is the power and wisdom of God (1 Cor. i. 24), and is our righteousness and sanctification (1 Cor. ii. 30, Jer. xxii. 6), the Saviour of all men but especially of them who believe, 1 Tim. iv. 10. The specially saved of God are his elect ones (Is. Ixii. 12), whether Jews or Gentiles, for they were redeemed from among men and nations as the first fruits unto God and to the Lamb, Rev. v. 9; xiv. 4. They are the true Israel of God, the leaven that ultimately leaveneth the whole lump of humanity, and are they who are kept by the power of God through the faith of Christ unto salvation and glory, 1 Peter i. 5. The love of God is manifested by the whole work of him, the Righteous one, the Prince of peace (Is. ix, 6), the only true God and eternal life (1 John V. 20), who declared, because I live, ye shall live also (John xiv, 19,); He did the will of God who sent him, and finished his work (John iv, 34), even the works of his heavenly father, John ix. 4, xvii. 4. (To be continued.) A LITERARY EVENING WITH THE REV. DR. THOM OF LIVERPOOL. BY A DOCTOR OF TUE UNIVERSITY OF HEIDELBERG. The winter evening closes in. Sigismund, my friend, is with me : we are looking silently into the depths of the red-coal fire, for the fanciful faces of tlie wild and the grotesque ; and our German meerschaums, now smoked out, are lying on the stand before us. Two strokes on the door knocker, and a quick departing step — it is the postman! the bearer of a letlerwith a Chinese device. I break, and read. — Sigisnuuid, old college friend, cast aside thy grim reveries — see no more faces of the grotesque from out the live coals of my fire ; here is an invite from our friend Dr. Thorn. One evening, dear Sigismund, with such a man, is worth myriads of nights with your world's witlings ; so speed the time till then, then to be most repaid. The interim has flown ; and we, — that is to say, Sigismund (pure lover with a worship true of the great and ^'ood wherever found) and myself — stand within the garden gate of 3, St. Mary's Place. Open Sesame, hall door, and door of parloui-, and, the centre of a group of eager listeners, we come at once upon the Doctor ; an elderly man, say in years about fifty ; in lieight, slightly above tlie middle ; in figvire, moderately spare ; and in face, bearing a striking resemblance to the late Sir Walter Scott, A forehead, strikingly bold and well developed ; high, broad, and full; disfigured, however, most abominably, by an execrable old scratch, red Welch wig, or rather brown George, put on we should say without the sliglitest reference to back or front ; and which said antiquated peruke, we are necessitated to bjlieve, the Doctor unist have picked up in the purlieus of rag fair. O that a head so great should be imprisoned in a wig so vile ! The eye though! well said Lavater, that it was the window of the soul. It is so here indeed! A light, keen, sparkling grey, ever shifting, never at rest — fitful as a summer breeze; a nervous eye — most nervous, fulling before you, with an odd kind of abashment when you try to meet it, and felt to be probing you, and searching down into A LITERARY EVENING WITH DR. THOM. 7 the chambers of your spirit, when your glance is averted from it. But softly, and while we are sipping our coffee, made and poured out by the hands of the Doctor's amiable lady, let us reconnoitre the group around us. There are many around ; but there are three, that it would be unpardonable to pass. Look at that tall, gaunt, sun-burnt, man ; straight as a dart — flexible as a bow— slender as a reed ; unlicked looking as a backwoodsman, and supple as a king's wrestler ; sparing of speech as an oracle, and as more than an oracle gifted. That is Emerson, the transcendentalist. He has been lecturing to the members of the Roscoe club (now broken 'up, for this is nigh four years back) ; and has now come to sup with Dr. Thom, prior to his de- parture for America; bis sentences are jerked out ; his tone'is monotonous in the extreme ; but tlie twilight of heaven is in his eye, and his words are as " apples of gold, set in baskets of silver.^' Observe yon pale, thoughtful, quiet personage, with voice low and gentle, and converse high as with the gods. — " O ! broad, globe-like, massive forehead, stored with tomes of thought; what working brain is chronicled within thee? '' — -That of Philip James Bailey. The author of Festns stands revealed! And, who is that exceedingly pompous, but exceeding gentlemanly man, who talks so loud, and so nasally, and takes snufF, direct from Taddies, out of those two immense boxes ; — a most aristocratic handsome man in appearance indeed ! — a princely autocrat with a fine old officer-like air with him that stamps him with a most courtly impress ; forehead high and pyramic ; hair and whiskers white and silvery; and converse, elegant and well-read? That is Edwin Atherstone the poet, the author of The Fall of Nineveh, a poem, which in so far as mere painting and beautiful colouring is concerned, stands almost unsur- passed. But stay, yet once more, what elderly gentleman is that who is now speaking to Dr. Thom, with curly grey iiair, stooping gait, white cravat, and the most benevolent air that it is possible to conceive. If ever the milk of human kindness does indeed flow, in angel channel, through the midst of human soul, we cannot resist, as we gaze upon him, feehng certain, most certain, that it flows free and full, and meandering, through the entirety of the heart, to which that face belongeth. — Whose face is it? That of Principal McHveen, of the Lower School of the Liverpool Mechanics' Institution. And of what is he speaking? Upon human nature! he is the champion of the humanities — he is telling what God made man — but, somewhat, says he, "lower than the angels," and he is urging, what God's boundless love may yet do, for the first fruits of his creation ; that life is an education designed to renovate, ultimately, and that man, shall in the end, come out like gold tried in the fire. We say not that we are with him, nor do we assert the converse ; but whether or not, his philanthropy and benevolence is undoubted. But our honoured host, were he longer forgotten," i7 M'ere as a gap in our great feast and all things unbecoming." — Ur. Thom shines in the pulpit; he is without doubt the finest analytic and exegetical preacher that we have ever heard. Yet, when we see him here, the vesper-star of the domestic and the literary circle, we are tempted to believe that he shines even still more, though with another kind of radiance. Kind, nay affectionately so, he puts everyone at perfect ease in a moment — and, with the nicest and most delicate considei-ation, his sole aim seems to be, to elicit the peculiar talent of each, be it what it may " You Sir, are a Con- chologist, let us ramble upon the shore together'' — "a geologist, you mv friend, let us delve into the marls and stratas" — ah ! " and you are a poet too ; your latest song, I pray, and what of Tait and Bentley'' ? So in effect says the Doctor to each of his guests, adapting himself with a most rare felicity to the peculiar talent of each, guaging as it were intuitively each one's mind, and 7iot " fooling " it, but exhibiting it most advantageously, to the top of its bent. By so doing. Dr. Thom causes as it were, each of his guests, to be in love with each, merging 8 OF THE SCRIPTURE USE OF PASTORAL IMAGES. himself, in intent, but only to glow with a brighter, though most self uncon- scious light ; this, in an host, is a most rare quality to meet with, and Dr. Thom possesses it to a most remarkable extent, in fact it is characteristic of the man; and by this most happy knack of action on his part, he makes each of his guests feel as if the entertainment had been given and got up expressly on his, or her, account : nor is it on high, literary, and scientific subjects only, that he can elicit the sense of each ; he can descend, nay, such is his good nature, and so manifestly great his desire to make each at ease, with each, and with himself, that we firmly believe, that if a fishmonger were present, the Doctor would have from him the full price ciu'rent of haddock, mackerel and turbot, and the state of the Billingsgate market. No courtly gi*andee, in a word, no fine old nobleman of a bygone school, could more completely do the honours of his castle, than does Dr. Thom go through the ceremonies of 3, St. Mary's Place. What is this? the tray ! yes! for even Philosophers must eat, and the best of poets, are not chameleons. What! oyster patties? yes, even so, and cheesecakes dainty enough to tempt an anchorite with: tongue too! a work of supererogation that! for we have liad the best all evening; a little honey, nuts, and almonds also ? yea ! and washed down with a goodly vintage ! But hark I the chimes of Edgehill church are ringing twelve, and we have a duty to per- form. It is Dr. Thorn's birthday ! we must drink his health ! Principal McHveen says that I am to propose it. I speak feebly and hurriedly, something I know not what, for my spirit is stirred within me, and my heart is in my mouth, and the tears are in my eyes. But, I know what I wish, if I know not what I speak, " Health ! Health ! In body, soul, and spirit, to one of the great good men of God's creation, and each future birthday happier than the last. It is over : our nox " ambrosiance'^ hath ended !! Sigismund and I, are home again. And, hark! Sigismund, dear friend, a. word of words, in your ear, " We will no longer look for shadows in the sea-coal fire, for their are warm hearts in the world yet, and the age of intellects has not departed." Liverpool, December 18th, 1850. Wednesday Night. OF THE USE OF PASTORAL IMAGES IN THE FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE OF SCRIPTURE. Continued from Page 204. In continuation of the subject of the use of pastoral images in the figurative language of Scripture, according to our pi'omise as given in the last September number, it is intended to enter into some more minute particulars respecting pastoral life in general with its various circumstances, as typically used in Scripture ; to exhibit some slight views of that life such as it was and still is in the East ; and also to make some farther reference to the typical character of the natural sheep. There are certain conditions of the shepherd's life, not only in the East, but in most continental countries which never can have come under the obser- vation of such persons as have had no experience beyond our British Islands . in which protected regions, though there may be many extensive sheep walks, there can be none which are infested by savage beasts — none in which the shepherd is liable to fight to the death for his sheep, or in which the sheep are in actual peril of their lives whilst seeking their daily sustenance. It necdeth to go beyond the sea-girt shores of Britain to form by experience OF THE SCRIPTURE USE OF PASTORAL IMAGES. V any correct ideas of the hal)its and dangers of the shepherd and his flock, in countries yet uncultivated where there are immense tracts of waste land and deep forest coverts, where it is impossible to protect the pasture grounds on all sides from beasts of these deserts and the coverts of these forests — where the shepherd must be not only a watcher but a warrior, and where, in the faithful pursuit of his calling, he must not only oftentimes peril his life but endure perpetually all tliose sufferings so pathetically described by Jacob in his address to Laban, Thus I was — In the day the drought consumed me and the frost by night, Gen. xxxi.40. In his wanderings, the pastor must sometimes encounter those frozen blasts, which, passing over the fields of eternal snow, in some Alpine eminence above the clouds, rush down the gullies of the mountains into his pastures, freezing the brooks and streams in their passage and turning them as it were into stone ; and, again, he must be parched and dried up with the burning breath of the deserts of the south — a slender tent, a den or cave in the dust, or the shadow of a rock, being his best temporary residence, whilst his food and clothing must be uncertain and scant as those of him " Whnxe garment was of camel's hair, and his meat locusts and wild honey " his life in no way resembling that of the shepherd of the Arcadian fancy — which in very truth might better fit the condition of those shepherds of Israel to whom woe is proclaimed in Ezekiel xxxiv, because they feed themselves and do not feed their flock ; the whole existence of the shepherd being one exercise of anxiety for the preservation of his sheep — of which the best that can be said is, that they know his voice, and when they hear it that they follow him, for so he teaches them to acknowledge him though not so as he knoweth them, for the shepherd knows all his sheep individually and cares for tliose especially which arc most iu need. — Luke xv. 4 — 6. The instrument with which the shepherd rules and defends his flock is that which is commonly called the crook, the figure of which is adopted and used universally in the formularies of the great Anti- christian hierarchy. Who has not heard of the pastoral staff? The ideal meaning of this word staff or rod, in its largest sense, is an exten- sion of power ; the length of the rod being added to that of the arm, extending the power and influence of that arm by the length of the rod itself. The figu- rative signification of this natural object depends upon the character of the hand that wields it, and according to this nature is the translation given in many instances, as that of sceptre when it is placed in the hand of a king> that of rod of coiTcction in the hands of a magistrate, that of an extension of a family when spoken of a son or descendant of such family, &c. ; and when applied to pastoral images, being no other than the shepherds staff or crook as is proved in several pasages, especially in Psalm, xxiii. 4, " Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death" — " thy rod and thy staff they comfort me;'' and again Micah vii. 14, "Feed thy people with thy rod, the flock of thine heritage which dwell solitarily in the tvood in the inidst of Carmel ^-c. As it behoved the Lord the Saviour in his Divine and human nature to fill all space, so is he the antitype of every beautiful and desirable type, and hence in our view of pastoral imagery we find him as the rod or crook, or as it were the created instrument in his own hands ; as the shepherd, the uncreated or divine 10 OF THE SCRIPTURE USE OF PASTORAL IMAGES, essence. In the shepherd's tent we find a figure denoting the wandering, unsettled and very uncertain nature of the shepherd's life, extending to that of the life of every man in the flesh, not excepting that assumed by our Lord, as saith Isaiah xxxviii 12, "Mine age is departed and is removed from me as a shepherd's tent :" neither is there any doubt, were there leisure to pursue the subject, that there is no particularity in the accustomed mode of the shepherd's life which might not be used with advantage in helping the apprehension of this same subject in a spiritual point of view. That our Lord is the true shepherd there can be no dispute amongst Christian men, his own declaration being sufficient to set the matter at rest at once and for ever ; and that he is the Pastor of all the human race, which sliall hereafter be as one fold under him- self, the one shepherd, is also declared. Yet it is certain that the extension of his rule as a shepherd does not now appear, and in fact is not understood to exist at all, by any of those men who are of the world and only of the world. Of these many doubt the very existence of any flock of the Saviour's keeping ; and we, aa believers, are]]also taught that this flock is very small, and has been so and shall continue to be so till the time of the further manifestation of the true shepherd shall arrive. On this point there can be no question ; for there is not now and never has been any time or place in which the true sheep of his flock (that is those whom he has marked with his own signet) could gather together, nor even can be, until their covenant head, their chief shepherd shall appear — not- withstanding which — that is, this discouraging view of the case at this and at all times of the present dispensation, there is no order of figures, taken from natural things which by their use in the spiritual language of Scripture gives more glowing, more overpowering, more extensive assurances of the divine love than the one under present consideration; the subject beginning as it were with the^ most touching instances of individual love, as in Isaiah, xl 11, and going on to such expressions as could not, it might be thought, be limited or made exclusive by any ingenuity which could be used by those most incapable of admitting any enlarged ideas of divine love. Let us refer toEzekiel xxxivj which whole chapter speaks of the dealings of the chief shepherd with his flock and with those who rule among them as interior shepherds ; or rather as persons taking upon themselves to act as representatives of the chief shepherd, in which chapter, as if it were to silence the scoffer for ever, this expression is used in the last verse, "And ye my flock, the flock of my pasture are men and I am your God saith the Lord God.'" Ezek. xxxiv. 31. Observe again what David says, Ps. xcv. and c. in which last especially, all nations are called upon to make a joyful noise unto the Lord, that is, because they with all of us are his people and the sheep of his pasture. Isaiah also says chap. liii. in speaking of his fellow men, " All we like sheep have gone astray," &c. If more were wanting to prove, who are meant by the flock in the largest sense, we need only consult many passages in the New Testament and especially the latter part of the 10th. of St. John. It must however be carefully observed, that although there is full assurance from Scripture that all mankind will be ultimately admitted as members of one flock under one shepherd (else how would God be all in all ?) yet that they are not so now — there not being a place on earth, as there never has been a time A STORY OF GRACE. 11 since the Apostolic age, in which there has been more than two or three as it were met together in the name of the Lord Jesus ; and the reason of this is that the little flock on earth now in this present day has no visible head, therefore as the prophet writes, Ezek. xxxiv. 5, 6, And they were scattered because there is no shepherd ; and they became meat to all the beasts of the Jield, wheji they were scattered. My sheep wandered through all the mountains and upon every high hill : yea my flock was scattered upo7i all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them. But in order to do justice to this subject of the use of pastoral images in Scrips tui'e the discussion should rather extend over volumes than a few sheets, for if we have touched a few of the most important points we have done justice to no one of them, not even such justice as we could have done with more space : and others there are, to which we have not even alluded. One of these is the distinction between the goat and the sheep, both of which creatures, as victims under the Mosaic ritual, typified our Lord, and therefore neither of them is naturally significant of what is evil, though when both appear in Matt. xxv. the one is excluded from and the other admitted into the kingdom of heaven until the end of the age of that kingdom, a difficulty, which Avith some others, has already given way under the examination of a certain class of types which bear, though somewhat indirectly, on our present subject. We here conclude with this humble petition in behalf of that little flock, of which we trust that some of us at least are the members through the favour of that I-amb who now stands on Mount Sion, that we may not be permitted to mingle with those of our brethren in the flesh who thrust with side and with shoulder, and at the diseased, with horns ; but ever be as those with whom our Shepherd has made a covenant of peace, and so shall we dwell safely in the wilderness and sleep in the woods. M. M. S. A STORY OF GRACE. CHAPTER I. The family of the Richardsons was the most ancient in the town of B . The old house, which for many generations had been known as their residence, well represented to the eye, with its gables and antique window-casements, what the name of Richardson conveyed to the ear. There was antiquity in both: and in both, the present James Richardson cherished a pride and satis- faction which it was very natural to entertain. Who would ridicule him for attachment to a home with which time had entwined so manj' interesting associations? and who would chide him for partiality to a name untarnished by dishonour, and brightened by a thousand kind and generous actions? Like his ancestors, Mr. Richardson was a tradesman, and carried on an old established business by which he was enabled to bring up his family respect- ably, and provide for them a more liberal education than most people moving in a similar sphere cared to do. At the time our narrative commences, the elder son had been long enough in his father's employment to prove a valuable assistance ; and the younger, 12 A STORY OE GRACE. wlio was just leaving home to be placed in a hoiise of business in London, was the object of unusual parental solicitude, lest he should be led astray by the temptations to which he might be exposed, unguarded by those wholesome restraints, and unaided by the good example which home supplied. George, now a youth of fifteen, ^vas not wanting in respect for his parents, and appre- ciated the anxious interest they manifested in his behalf. Mr. Weldon, the party to whom he was to be apprenticed, was shghtly known to his father, and by the high recommendation of a mutual friend, he readily placed confidence in him ; and, at the appointed time, he accompanied his son to his new situation ; nor did he part from him without affectionately reminding him of those wise counsels he had been exhorted to follow. Mr. Weldon was a man of integrity; but so absorbed was he in lijs business that he found little time for the cultivation of his mind ; and, though a member of the Christian society, meeting at the Tabernacle, Moorfields, recently formed by that remarkable individual, the Rev. George Whitfield, his regular attend- ance in his place on Sunday, and at the communion once a month, was all the manifested sympathy he had for the church to which he belonged. We would not say that he was deficient in Christian principle, but it did not assume that form, which, in the eyes of his fellow members, consistency with his profession required. Mr. Richardson requested Mr. Weldon to take his son with him to his place of worship, without thinking it of consequence to ask him of what persuasion he might be; and accordingly George accompanied his master to hear the great preacher. Hitherto he had troubled himself but little about religion; he had been trained to venerate the Church, and might be said to imitate his father in the decent observance of those duties which sufficed to satisfy the requirements of their religion. It is not necessary to narrate all that subsequently transpired between this period and the time when George began to think and judge for himself, as one personally interested in the subject of religion. He pleased his master, and was comfortable in his situation ; and his friends were gratified by intelligence of his well-being, and by his occasional visits amongst them. The i)eriod of apprenticeship was rapidly drawing to a close ; and George was anticipating manhood, independence, and self-support. Mr. Weldon had for some time observed an unusual seriousness in his young assistant, and was glad of an opportunity which ere long presented itself, of enquiring into the cause of it. George was naturally open-hearted, and did not hesitate to admit that he had latterly lost that vivacity and buoyancy of spirit which had distinguished his character; and acknowledged that the subject of religion was the cause of perplexity and anxiety. He had recently heard a sermon which had had the effect of making him feel how ignorant he was of that which now appeared to him of the greatest importance ; and he appealed to his master for advice and guidance. It would be unjust to say that Mr. Weldon had no sympathy whatever for a person in George's state of mind ; but the absorbing nature of his business, engrossing the multitude of his waking thoughts, unfitted him for the position in which he found himself suddenly placed. Feeling awkward and perplexed, A STORY OF GRACE. 13 he resolved as most convenient under the circumstances, to refer the case to one of tlie officers of the Society. Ele therefore proposed to tlie you"g man an interview with one of the deacons, and kindly recommending the study of the Word of God, and private prayer, terminated the conversation. Some weeks elapsed before the interview took place, during which time George failed not diligently and prayerfully to read the Word of God. It is not surprising that one great source of inquietude was the impression produced by those urgent appeals, those vivid repi-esentations of the dreadful condition in which man is placed by the corruption of his natnre and his actual trans- gression against God's holy law ; and the tremendous consequences in which all was to issue in a future world. Frightful were the pictures wliich had been presented to his mind ; and while they filled him with alarm, he felt at a loss to reconcile them with the character of God, which the preacher as well as the Scriptures declared was love and pity to the guilty and the lost. The first interview was followed by others at no distant intervals ; and, at length, George was proposed for membership iti the Whitfield Society. He had, according to the report of the worthy deacon, become " hopefully converted," and " a new creature in Christ," and according to the testimony of his master} he had "become himself again." In truth George had gone through a great deal ; and it was a slow and laborious process by which he had at length attained a sort of conviction that he was of that little flock which God had exclusively loved from all eternity, and for which Christ had shed his blood. And tremblingly did he taste the consolation which he was told it was now his privilege to partake. Had it not been for a kind and benevolent heart — a prominent feature of the Richardson character — he might have grown indifferent to the condition of those wlio were supposed to be uninterested in the covenant mercy of God — who were shut up — not to the faith — but to the doom which their original depravity and consequent sins Lad assigned them. His term of apprenticeship had expired ; and, by the high recommendation of his late master, he had obtained a responsible situation in a house in the same line of business, but carrying on much more extensive transactions. Here he acquitted himself honourably and secured the confidence of the part- ners of the firm. It was George's delight to study the Word of God ; and, as doctrines which were regarded as essential truths of that Word presented them- selves more clearly to his mind, and as their mutual relation began to be perceived and gathered up into something like system, he was pleased when he could get the opportunity of conversing with the deacon who had had the interviews with him previous to his admission into the Tabernacle Society, and who had ever since taken a lively interest in his spiritual welfare. Actuated by a sincere desire to live to the glory of God, he had become an honourable and active and useful member of the church to which he belonged ; and had so far advanced in the acquirement and experience of the religious views which were current among them, as to be looked up to as an •' established Christian.'' Considering how much there was in his adopted creed to depress, his consolation might be said to abound ; and it was thought that he enjoyed as much of the light of God's countenance as was consistent with his personal safety ! He was humble and simple; and without submitting his feelings to a 14 REVIEW. very strict analysis, he had as good a hope through grace us he thought it was the privilege of any uninspired man to enjoy. But ere long his mind was to become the arena of another conflict. A cir- cumstance was about to transpire in connection with the society which was to lead him to a thorougli sifting of his present views and very materially affect his future course. REVIEW. Why is Poperij Progressing ? By David Thom, D.D. Ph.D. Second Edition. London : H. K. Lewis. It comes not within our province, and it is not therefore incumbent upon us, asUniversalists, to take part in the strife which is now agitating the mass of the people of this realm. We cannot, however, but feel an interest in passing events which are more or less to influence and mould the future of men's minds, religious opinions, and ecclesiastical institutions ; and gloomy and fearful as are the forebodings of the enemies of Rome, we are sanguine as to the good which sooner or later, under the all-wise and sovereign controul of the Almighty, will be evolved. To get attention drawn to the subject of religion is good ; and if, by means of the agitated waters of ecclesiastical commotion, they should be led to seek the side of the still waters of the sacred scriptures, there to see the calm placid reflection of eternal truth, an invaluable end will be secured. Of the brochure which now claims our attention, and which first appeared some fifteen years ago, the well-known and justly-esteemed writer has now most opportunely published a second and cheap edition. That popery has been making considerable advances in this country during the last quarter of a century, and progressing each year at an inci'eased ratio is not denied by any party. But why is popery progressing ? This is the question our author proposes to answer in his pamphlet. This is the question which, during the last few weeks, has been answered a thousand times and in almost as many different ways. An answer has been returned from the Vatican. Providence has been singularly indulgent ! — England has been most mercifully dealt with; rarely has a country which has once been cut off on account of her sins been grafted into the good olive tree again. And his Holiness wonders at the amazing forbearance and goodness of the Almighty in achieving what has just been consummated on behalf of England, now restored to her orbit amongst the fair countries under the protection of the great head of the visible church. Angrily and loudly do the anti-Roman-Catliolic emancipationists annoimce the accomplishment of their predictions. It is just what they knew and said would happen ! They foresaw it all, and they said so at the time. Cut down those parliamentary bulwarks of our protestant constitution, and what can you expect but to have the enemy coming in like a flood ? alas ! for the spurious libei-ality and truckling poUcy of a vacillating ministry ! Why is popery progressing? And who answers next? The party to whom attention is drawn by the last reply, to be sure. It is, of coin-se, quite pre- posterous to suppose that the prime minister of England should have contem- plated the fact upon which the question is i-aised, and which he will now answer forthwith. While he is careful to make known that his antipathy to the scarlet lady is extreme, he does not fear foreign a<.'gression a bit, but he will answer the question (better let it alone, periiaps, we should have said had we happened to be of the cabinet) and what does he say ? Traitors in the camp — unworthy sons of the church, with their intoning of prayers, their munnnerieSj WHY IS POPERY PROGRESSING? 15 vestments, candles, auricular confession, &c. — dreadfully alarmed at this, and not at all to be wondered at that the Pope should, &c. Ten thousand voices echo the reason assigned in the letter to the Bishop of Durham. The premier has struck the right note surely, and is not unhappy to find himself so well sustained! But another reply is given even while we are considering what next, and this is specially addressed to tlie ear of the noble Lord, who is by this time well nigh overcome by his intoxicating popularity, and in accents loud enough for any one to hear who will listen. The answer comes from St. Barnabas, the edifice which the noble Lord had the satisfaction to assist in rearing, the edifice in which for seven long years the noble Lord has been accustomed to say " amen" to Mr. Bennett's " muUerings," in the support of whose institutions and pecu- liarities the noble Lord has, accordhig to the Rev. Mr. Bennet, taken a lively interest. And what answer does Mr. Bennett return to our question ? That the Reformed have gradually departed so for from the doctrines and practices of their own church, that dissatisfaction has been raised in the minds of many of the faithful who, since to restore the established system to purity seemed to them utterly impossible, have betaken tliemselves, for relief, to that " branch of Christ's Universal Church" of which his Holiness is the infallible head. That they should do so, is naturally very much to be deplored ; and he would put a stop to such secessions by holding yet more tenaciously and practising yet more scrupulously all that the rubric, approves, enjoins, or allows. The premier may make the be-it he can of the disclosures of Mr. Bennett's letter. And so far from meritingthe censure passed upon him, Mr. B. is entitled to the warmest thanks of England's church. Other voices are ready to respond, — but enough. Let us now hear one who for many years has occupied a position from which he might take an imjoartial and comprehensive view of the whole question. To do him justice it would be necessary to quote at considerable length from his pages, but as this is imprac- ticable on account of our limited space, we trust our readers will procure the pamphlet and read it for themselves. We will do no more than intimate what the Dr. most eloquently and forcibly maintains to be the greatest cause of the ex- tension of the pope's power within these realms. He points out and corrects the mistake which attributes to the Reformation that perfection and completeness which it were preposterous to expect. It was not likely that every error would be detected, and it was as unlikely that every truth would be discovered. The Reformers were men of like passions with ourselves, and would yet cling to principles and usages repugnant to the purity and simplicity of the doctrine of Christ. Our protestant contemporaries make a capital mistake in regarding the Reformation as the ne plus ultra of perfection. In creeds, confessions, catechisms, and such like protestant defences, he points out a coincidence between the claimed infallibility of the pope and the self-asserted orthodoxy of protestants. The pope says — " dare to think or take a step farther than I prescribe, at your peril." jNowif the creed means anything it means this too. No matter how diversified and contradictory of each other these creeds may be ; each asserts, for his own, divine authority, and in this feature the family likeness is very strong. " Since they are only all agreed In damning one another's creed." Our author further traces in the unscriptural practices of protestants — the per- formances of ceremonies, the services and offices, the observance of days and seasons, the priestly administration of ordinances, the ordination of bishops and ministers, &c., a vast amount of corruption and error, in all of which the essence of popery, and popery itself, find sanction and encouragement. And this not in the church of England only ; dissenters and members of the estab- lishment are both implicated. To their less obvious origin and recondite first cause the Dr. then goes on to 16 CORRESPONDENCE. trace those corrupt and eartlily systems of religion, tliat sisterhood of liarlots, of whom he regards the churcli of Rome not as the mother but the eklest sister,* of whose final overthrow the word of God abounds in unmistakable predictions. As temporary, external, and human, and consequently opposed to the spiritual and the divine, they must eventually perish, The prospect is animating. His hope is not in any human power; "to tlie word of the living God'' he observes, " and to it alone do I look, for an effectual stop being put to the onward march of popery.'' This surely is the only ground upon which we may place any confidence ; " the word of the Lord endureth for ever." We heartily wish for this pamplilet a M'ide circulation. Let those who have the opportunity employ it in giving it distribution, and thus draw attention to a view of this all-absorbing subject which shall lead protestants to reflect whether they may not be doing more to promote popery than Pio Nono him- self has it in is power to efiect. Z. CORRESPONDENCE. To the Editor of''' The (Jnivcrsalist," Sir, — There are various points of view in which the same truth may be exhibited ; and each is calculated to produce its effect on different minds. Those who reject salvation as the work "f God, perfected in Christ crucified and raised from the dead - — as a work wrought for us, (and in us who believe,) by infinite love; and with which the work of man, excepting as an instrumental or ministerial power, hath nothing to do — these, I say, create a hell of eternal torments for those whom they (in their Godlike charity !) are pleased to judge worthy of such a doom. Now we would say to these, God mani- fests himself to man in the works of creation. For, as by analogy, the heavens and the earth that now are seen, arc for a sign of that new heavens and new earth which is to be. Bcliold, then, this earth which we inhabit, as it rolls in mid space, surroimdcd by the vault of heaven, within which, as in the womb of a mother, it lives, and moves, and has its being ! ]3e- hold these heavens, the symbol of the eternal glory, surrounding us on every side, as with the outstretched arms of the Almighty — and into whicli the earth fmtst fall, if it fall from its sphere ! Behold them, and say. Whither shall I go from thy Spirit, or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven. Thou art tlicrc ! and if I make my bed in the grave (hell), bcliold, Ihou, in the person of my Redeemer, art there ! If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, (tlic image of death), even tliero shall thy hand lead me, and tliy rUjht hand shall support me. Say, then, Cliristian-infidel, where is this hell of yours to which, in the pride of self-righteousness, you consign your bro- ther ? Is it in heaven, where love dwells ? Or is it in the earth where sin dwells, and where you dwell ? If in the earth, anO in the earthy— which is to say in the carnal mind — will not God, the Judge of the World, when he shall come to destroy the earth, destroy this hell of yours, and fill the void with His presence, as with the spirit of love ? Hell is in the heart of those who, like to Cain, hate another — as Christ, in the power of the Holy Spirit, the spirit of divine love, dwells in all who love their neighbour as themselves. Love, that thinketh no evil, even in death, said, — Love all men, as I have loved you. Do this, and then shall even this earth, be as the kingdom of God and of his Christ; for the kingdom of God is the presence and the power of love. I am, Sir, Your obedient Servant, J. W. P.S. — Will any of your readers inform me wliat advantage the Christian hath over the Jew, if Christ be not received by faith, as the Saviour of a world of sinners? For under the law it is written, we were shut up to faith. Are not, therefore, tliey who deny Christ to be the Saviour of the whole world, as in I John ii 2, Jadaizing Christians — the heretics, or Anti-Christs who should come ? as in 1 Cor. xi, 19, 1 John ii, 18. This place of torment is said to be " outer darkness." And wliere is outer darkness ? We answer — Where God is not — in the liglit of love, as seen in the face of Jesus Christ. * We must refer the reader to liis " Advertisement " for tlje Dr.'s matured views of the state- nients of Scripture on tliis subject. THE UNIVEESALIST. FEBRUARY, 1851. ON DEUTERONOMY XXXII. 22, AND PSALM. IX. 17. It is commonly supposed, that three kinds of death were incun-ed by the fall : death natural, death spiritual, and death eternal. It could not be death eternal, as neither the phrase nor any other equivalent to it occurs in the whole Bible ; in proof of which the reader is referred to the leading article for April, 1850, p. 73. It could not be death spiritual ; because " that was not first which is spiritual," (1 Cor. xv. 46) and therefore Adam could not lose what he did not possess. Death natural was therefore the whole penalty. So much is added in con- firmation of the explanation, given in our last number, of Gen. ii. 7. The passages in the Old Testament supposed to teach, or countenance, the doctrine of endless torment consist, for the most part, of those in which the word SlNU^ ( sheol) is translated hell. It occurs 65 times, out of which it is 3 times translated the pit, 31 times the grave, and the rest hell ; of which last 2 are also rendered the (jrave in the margin. It " signifies," says Doctor Campbell, (^and his assertion remains un- contradicted,) " the state of the dead in general, without regard to the goodness or badness of the persons, their happiness or misery." Dissert. Vol.1 . p. 274. The word hell indeed appears to have changed its meaning since the received translation was made; so that whether we consider its etymology, or the sense which it evidently requires in some places, (for example in Ps. xvi. 10,) it is difficult to say how or when it came to bear that of a place of torment commonly annexed to it.* Such however being the case, I shall notice two which have been urged in its support with some show, at first sight, of plausibility. Deut. xxxii. 22. — " a brief, but very strong prophetical outline of the character and fate of the Jewish nation. And first, as to the dis- obedient portion of it (ver. 5) : They have corrupted themselves, their spot is not the spot of his children ; they are a perverse and crooked generation. We then have a recital of the favours conferred on them generally, as chosen to be the people of God (6 — 15), But, it is added, Jeshurun waxed fat and kicked, &c. In ver. 21, the calling in of the Gentiles, to move them to jealousy, is brought before us (comp. Rom. X. 19, &c.), as noticed by St. Paul. We then have (ver. 22) the fire * 7lNiy (sheol) literally signifies the sought, aSi; (hades) which corresponds to it in the New Testament, the unseen, and hell (from the Anglo Saxon hel-an, or German hullen, to cover) the covered — place or state understood. Hence also the words heal and health, VOL, II, E 18 ON DEUT. XXXII. 22, AND PSALM IX. 17. predicted which should hum to the lou'est hell, consume the earth (land ?), and set on fire the foundations of the mountains. Not, be it observed, so to consume the physical world, and set on fire the foundations of its mountains, — wlaich is perliaps impossible, — but to destroy that dis- obedient people by fire, sword, pestilence, and famine, and to scatter them throughout the whole earth, as the following verses expressly tell us (25 — 27)." Lee's Inquiry, p. 24, 25. Doctor Lee adds, in a note on ver. 22, " This is the first place in which this destruction by fire is mentioned. We shall hereafter find it frequently repeated in similar terms, which some have imprudently imagined foretells a conflagration of the physical world. Hence, no doubt, the notions of the Stoics, that the world should be destroyed by fire." Ps. ix. 17. " The wicked are not only to be punished here ; but here- after ; and I think this passage proves a future state of misery. For could the author possibly mean no more than that the wicked should be brought to the grave ? All are brought there ; so that this could, of itself, be no mark of divine judgment." Boothroyd. According to this, there is no difference between the man who dies of old age, and the man who is executed, or who shortens his life by evil courses. The words " turned into blN^ " express judicial and untimely excision ; and are equivalent to the^ declaration, "Bloody and deceitful men shall not live out half their days." Ps. Iv. 23. He adds, " I have retained the word hell, as evidently intended." A translator should not exceed his province by making the text express his own disputable sense. This indeed is a fault of most translators of the Bible, in which it ought to be especially avoided. " Translators," says Primate Newcome, *' should be philologists, and not controversialists" — an indispensable rule, but not always observed by the Primate himself. Boothroyd is not consistent with himself, as he translates a nearly similar passage in Ps. xxxix. 17, " Let the wicked be ashamed, and go down into hades ;" and observes, in a note, that *' The sense is, let them be so far from succeeding in their designs as to perish and die through them." The retribution, in Ps. ix. 15 — 17, corresponds to that in 6 — 8; and the whole Psalm, like many others, relates to Gospel times, and the excision is that of Jewish and Heathen persecutors. R. R. ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF GOD'S LOVE TO MAN. Continued from Page 6. The love of God as regards time, is known and enjoyed only by his church; to the beheving ones it is given to taste of the things of God. Man naturally is his own lawgiver, being subjected to his own conscience (Rom. ii, 14, 15), and is also his own idolater : for lie sets up an imaginary god and worships it (Is. xliv, 17), in the hope of reward ; he sitteth in the temple of his mind and is a god to liiniself. He does uot know that he is already dead in trespasses and sins (Eph. ii, 5, Cor. ii, 1.'?), but ignorantly fancies that the God of Scrip- ture is sucli an one as himself. ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF GOd's LOVE TO MAN. 19 It is God who giveth man to know that, as a descendant of Adam, he is a guilty and condemned being ; hating God's law, not loving it; that Adam's sin is his sin and that the wages of sin is death (Rom. vi, 23) to the infant, as Avell as to the adult : for all flesh is guilty before God, and remains subject to death and hades, until Christ, the living one and the just one (Ezek. xviii, 8 — 9), shall newly create all things to himself (Is. xlv, 7, ixv, 17 — 20), when that which is shadowy and temporal shall be superseded by that which is substan- tial and eternal. It is God who giveth man to know that righteousness 'is not of the law; that by the law is the knowledge of sin ; that the law was given by Moses, and that grace and truth came by Jesus Christ (John i. 17) ; that siu reigned only till the death of Christ (Rev. 21), that grace might thenceforward reign through his righteousness unto eternal life ; that Christ is the spirit and the truth, the Lord and giver of light and life ; and is the beneficent one. (Mark X. 18.) It is he, who gives his elect to know that even now in time, they have rigliteousness in him, not their own which is of the law, but that which is of God through the faith of Christ (Phil. iii. 9) ; that they are also justified by his faith (Gal. ii. 16), and have a victory over law, sin, death, and Hades, in that when Christ rose from the dead with righteousness received from his heavenly father Jehovah, who was the God of his salvation, (Is. xii. 2, xliii. 2, 3) they rose in him, and in virtue of that resurrection have passed from death unto life (John v. 24, 1 John iii. 14). God gives his church to know that in Christ Jesus were all the requirements demanded by the justice of God fulfilled, that in him who loved and served God with his whole heart, and mind, and soul, and strength, and who loved his neighbour as himself (Mark xii. 30, 31, Matt. xxii. 37), mercy and truth met together; righteousness and peace kissed each other (Psalm xxxv. 10); and that God is just in the fact of his justifying the ungodly (Rom. iii. 19 — 26) for it is God who created darkness and formed light; who created evil and made peace ; he Jehovah doeth all these things (Is. xlv. 7). It is by the love of God being manifested to us individually, that we know God is our Father ; that we have the witness in ourselves (1 John v. 10), that we love God because he first loved us (1 John, iv. 10 19, John xv. 16) ; that by his word enlightening our hearts and consciences, through his chastening and our possessing thereby the peaceable fruits of Christ's righteousness (Heb. xii. 11), viz. faith, joy, and peace in believing (Gal. v. 22, Rom. xv. 13), we are made a willing and faithful people in the day of his power (Psalms ex. 3), and each of us enabled to say he hath led me into his banqueting house, and his banner over me is xove (Cant. ii. 4.). We are each possessed of that same I AM principle of love wherewith God loved Christ (John xvii. 26). 'l"he knowledge of God is eternal life now to us who believe (1 John v. 13, 20) j for we are saved from the effects of law, sin, death, and Hades, by the faith of Christ according to his will and purpose (Eph. 1 — 7, 11) before the worlds were framed (2 Tun. i. 9), and are sanctified by Christ's fulfilling God's will through theofFeringof hisownbody (Hebrews x. 14, 1 Cor. vi. 11), whereby he was perfected, and became the author of eternal salvation (Heb. v. 9). We are set free from the law (Rom. viii. 2) and made free indeed (John viii. 36), are separated from the world by his truth (John xvii. 17, 19), and placed above all law; for the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set us free from the law of sin and death (Rom. viii. 7), and is to us a privilege and a blessing; even a law of love, which constrains us to live not unto ourselves, but unto him who loved us and gave himself for us (Gal. i. 4, ii. 20). We are made new creatures in him (2 Cor. v. 17), and are now possessed of the earnest of the divine nature (2 Peter i. 4, 1 John iv. 13), even the earnest of the spirit (2 Cor. i. 22, V. 5), a principle of life and love, an heavenly attribute which cometh down from above, whose author and perfecteris God (James i. 17). It is by the love of God we know that we are complete in Christ (Col. ii. 10) ; that we were baptized andj buried with him in his death, which is the 20 ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF GOd's LOVE TO MAN. true baptism (Psalm xlii. 7, Col. ii. 12, Luke xii. 50. Rom. vii. 3, 4, 5) and antitype of John's baptism. In Christ we have the one spirit, the one faith, the one baptism, and the one Lord (Eph. iv. 4, 5), the one God and Saviour (Isaiah xlv. 15) and Father of all (Eph. iv. 6). It is written "blessed are the dead which die in the Lord, for they rest from their labours, and their works do follow them (Rev. xi. 4 — 1.3). When Christ died, we died in him ; for if one died for all, then were all dead {'.] Cor. v. 14) ; and when Christ rose from the dead we rose in him, througli the faith of the operation of God, who raised him from the dead (Col. ii. 12). We are also crucified with him (Kom. vi. 6) and live ; yet not we but Christ liveth in us; and the life we now live is by the faith of the Son of God (Gal. ii. 20, Hab. ii, 4), being born again of incorruptible seed by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever^(l Peter i. 23). The love of God is infinite ; for when we were enemies, he reconciled the world to himself by the death of his Son, that the world might be saved by his life (Rom. v. 10, Col. i. 22, 1 John iv. 14); and as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive ; therefore the love of God constraineth us to live now unto Christ, the first sheaf of the harvest, as obedient children of his resurrection, by the grace now brought to us, by the revelation of Jesus Christ (Rom. xvi. 25, 26, Gal. i. 12, 1 Cor. ii. 10, Eph. i. 17—23), having our minds renewed by the spirit of the living God. By the light of God's love we know that it is like himself unbounded ; that as Christ himself is the first begotten from the dead (Rev. i. 5), and is the first fruits of the harvest unto God (1 Cor. xv. 20), so will God who raised Christ from the dead, also quicken our mortal bodies (Rom. viii. 11), and by his spirit will deliver the creature from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God (Rom. viii. 21). By the love of God shall all flesh know the Lord (Is. xlix. 26) ; for his knowledge shall be extended to the uttermost parts of the earth as the waters cover the sea (Hab. ii. 14) ; and every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, shall be heard saying *' Blessing and honor and glory and power be unto him that sitteth on the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever (Rev. v. 13). 'I'he whole creation shall then be delivered from its present groaning (Rom. viii. 22) ; and every creature see the manifestation of God (Isai. xl. 4, 5, lii. 101 and be made alive in him, who is not the God of the dead but of the Hving (Luke XX. 38), and is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever (Heb. xiii. 8). Then shall this mortal have become immortality, and this corruptible, incor- ruption (1 Cor. xv. 53) ; not by our being unclothed but clothed upon; by the supeiseding of the old man, by the putting on of the new man ; which, after God, is created in righteousness and true holiness (Eph. iv. 24); then shall we bear in fulness the image of the heavenly Christ Jesus, as we now bear the image of the earthly man- Jesus (1 Cor. xv. 49), to the honor and praise of him, who shall have then made us one heavenly fold under one heavenly shepherd, with glorified bodies and glorified minds like unto the Son of God (Phil. iii. 21), enjoying heavenly blessings throughout eternity. Then shall tliK new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteous- ness, have superseded the old heavens and the old earth (2 Peter iii, 13), and time shall be no longer (Rev. x. 6) : for all that is shadowy shall then have been swallowed up by that which is substantial and eternal. B_hold what manner of love the Father will then have bestowed upon us, for we shall have been received into his glory, and have been made like unto Christ seeing him as he is (1 John iii. 2) — a God of Love, and this because Christ himself — who was the heaveidy grain of wheat (John xii. 24), sown in corruption and mortality, even in the earthly ground of humanity, whereby he became one with us, for he had Mary for his mother — died, in order to be raised Irom the dead in incorruption and immortality ; that we, the earthly seed, •own in him the heavenly ground, whereby we became one with God, for he A STORY OF GRACE. 21 had God for his fatlier, might die in him also, to be raised with him in incor- ruption and immortality (1 Cor. xv. 53) to a heavenly inheritance which fadeth not away (1 Peter i. 4). So God thus takes back to himself the marred vessel : even the first man, the first Adam, made perfect in Christ Jesus, the perfect vessel ; even the second man, tlie second Adam : and we all shadows of men only, being one in the first Adam, and also one in the second Adam, are destined to be made substantial in God, who is substance, in wliom there is neither male nor female (Gal. iii. 28), but all one, as God is one (Gal. iii. 20, Isah. xii. 2, xxvi. 4) who then, as the heavenly reaper, will have reaped unto himself his heavenly harvest; for God is love (1 John iv. 8) ; love to you, love to me, love to all ; and this because he was love to one, who is the Amen, the faithful and true witness ; the beginning of the creation of God (Rev. iii. 14), even Jesus Christ (John xvii. 24, 16) our Lord (Acts ii. 36) and our God (Acts ii. 39, Mark xii. 29, Rev. xix. 1). A STORY OF GRACE. CHAPTER II. The assumptions of the Church of Rome are opposed by Protestants on the ground that those assumptions are unsupported by the great and final standard of appeal — the word of the living God. The word of God is with them so far paramount. But, not finding the principle which induces them to turn their backs upon the communion of the Church of Rome broad enough or strong enough to bind them together in visible fellowship, protestants must needs supplement it with something else — that something else proving the immediate source of division, and the prolific cause of churches ; all holding one principle in opposition to Rome, but each defending different views in opposition to the rest. And, while, as against one pseudo church they will confederate together, as among themselves they must needs come to their creeds, and confessions, and church standards. O ! Protestantism ! we can bear with the diversities of opinion among thy children — nay, we love thee much for permitting them ; but we grieve to think, that those who bear thy name should so attire Thee in the garb of " articles of faith '' wrought in such strong anathematizing texture as to make Thee oftentimes appear a very popish Guy ! Hence a means by which a diflSculty is most easily overcome, when a mem- ber of such a church discovers (whether right or wrong, no matter now) a dis- crepancy between his church creed and the word of God, an appeal, not to the latter, but to the creed, in opposition to the individual, is made. And so the something eke, or church creed, takes the place of the word of God : a fact, which may be corroborated by the history of all protestant churches, and which we strongly suspect is essential to their existence. Let those who feel the truth of these remarks ponder them ; while in excuse for this digression, we must plead what follows, A report had for some time been afloat in the Whitfield society, that an excellent and talented individual, who had for a considerable period been one of its influential members, had attended the Meeting of James Relly, a man who was regarded by the church as a person of most corrupt morals, and a 22 A STORY OP GRACE. preacher of the most licentious tenets. More than this — he was suspected, and not without reason, of having favoured his sentiments, and by some it was affirmed that he had openly defended the doctrine which Rally proclaimed. The report spread, and it soon became evident that the matter must be brought formally and finally to an issue. Grief was expressed by some, that so good and useful a man should have been "led away." Others, as bitter against Relly as they were ignorant of his doctrine, longed for the expulsion of an individual, who, like a diseased limb, might soon infect the whole body with the virus of his dreadful distemper. But there were many, and among them was George Richardson, who, knowing his blameless character, and believing him to have " the root of the matter " in him, were anxious that he should, if possible, be retained in the fellowship of the Tabernacle ; and who anticipated that he would so far submit to the voice of the church, as to suppress, if not abandon, that which it was reported he had embraced. Great was the sur- prise which was felt generally that one, who had actually been deputed by the church to "reclaim " a young lady who had recently abandoned the Whitfield Society for that of the Rellyan congregation, and lead her out of her "error," should have fallen into it himself; and vastly perplexed were some pious per- sons at " the mysterious providence '' which allowed such an one to be entrap- ped by the pernicious Relly ! " Alas ! " said one of them, who had accompanied him on his errand, when he heard of the meeting which was to be held for the purpose of considering what must be done with their wandering brother, " alas ! that to get a fellow creature out of the mud, one should run so dreadful a risk of sticking in it oneself. Grievous is it to think that one so promising, should, in the very act of attempting to draw others out of 'the miry clay,' only plunge into it himself; nevertheless, if it be so, the church would lamentably fail in its duty, if it did not act, and that, too, decisively and immediately ; for who knows, but that if ' One sickly sheep infect the fiock 'T will poison all the rest.' The regulations of the society must be employed speedily to clear us of so dangerous an enemy ! '' And with the determination of seeing cut off from the fold his recent friend, companion, and counsellor, but now the object of his dislike and even his dread, he found himself at the meeting at which the subject was to be discussed. John Murray — "the father of Universalism in America," was summoned to answer the charge of having countenanced the doctrine of Universal Salvation. The charge was preferred ; but, being highly esteemed by the people generally, for his many Christian excellencies, his talents, and his usefulness, he was censured ; and a proposal was made to him, that he should remain a member of their communion only on condition of his maintaining strict silence on the subject of Universal Salvation— a proposal reflecting as much discredit on those who made it, as it would have been to his disgrace had he so far violated Ciiristian principle as to accede to it. The noble man had too much good sense, and truth had too strong a hold of his heart to allow him to sacrifice his conscience to such a compromise. He loved the people ; and their principles, except as they were to some extent modified by his universalism, were . still A STORY OF GRACE. 23 his : he was reluctant to be severed from tliem, and shrank from the apparent disgrace and its attendant evils to which an expulsion would expose him. His path was plain, though it might be rough ; and his reply was briefly given . Uiihesitatingl}', yet modestly, he declined their oifer : the price was far too high for the good he would still retain ; and, to his great grief, a very small majority secured his expulsion, as Jiis own very interesting autobiography shows. That night, George Richardson returned to his lodging thoughtful and sad. He had had but little intercourse with Murray, but he knew him to be a thorough, honest, wann-hearted, Christian man. He had looked up to him, as his fellow-members had done, with sentiments of veneration, as to a father in the Church, and to see the disgrace into wliich he was thrown by this act of the Society was overwhelming. What had Murray done ? Had he committed any great sin ? It could hardly be so ; for the Church would not propose a compromise with an open transgressor. Murray was not charged with any sin, but -with false doctrine — doctrine which he might keep shut up in his own bosom if he pleased, and retain his place among "the people of God." And why, thought George, should he be allowed to retain it in his heart, if out of the abundance of his heart his mouth might not speak ? Why tolerate him in drinking of polluted waters, and forbid his offering them to others ? Does not their unaccepted proposal afford somesanction to that which they have just been condemning by Murray's expulsion ? And should they allow a man to cherish a serpent even in his own bosom ? This they were willing to do : possibly the serpent might not be venomous ! These reflections tended to shake George's faith in the elders of the Society. He could not bring his mind to justify the condemnation tiiat had been pronounced upon him ; and, though the doctrine of universal salvation, as he understood it, was awfully bad, he had so far de- cided at the meeting in favour of the accused as to hold up his hand against his expulsion ; and it was some consolation to think that he had thus protested against his condemnation. Of Kelly's opinions and practices, George had heard but little. That he was a bad man, that he encouraged people to live in sin, that his congregation con- sisted of the dissolute and the profane, and that all that perverted ingenuity could do to turn the grace of God into licentiousness Relly did, was what he simply believed upon the authority of Christian brethren who mentioned not the name without recoiling with evident horror at the thought of so much wickedness. Murray cannot, he argued, as he still pondered the matter, have sanctioned all that these people say and do ; he cannot have run to the same excess of riot ; he cannot have said, as they say, " Let us sin that grace may abound;" — or the Church would never have proposed that he should remain among us on any condition. He can only have adopted their theory of the salvation of all men. And what is that? George had never given the matter five minutes serious attention until now. And the question forced itself upon his mind. But it was growing late. St. Paul's had struck twelve. To his sadness and thoughtfulness were added perplexity and confusion. He could not perceive the principle upon which the Church had acted in regard to John Murray. 24 A WORD TO CHRISTIANS OF EVERY CREED. He could not understand how the pious and consistent Christian could be beguiled into such a pernicious belief as that of which he believed Relly to be the defender. The compromise proposed by the Church had produced on his mind an impression that possibly there was no great harm in cherishing some such belief in some way ; and the question, whether such a belief was sanctioned by Scripture in any way or not, could not be dismissed. That Jesus Christ had shed his blood for the guilty, and that his sacrifice was the only ground of a sinner's hope towards God, was not a more essential part of his creed than was the doctrine that the Church — consisting of those only who were chosen of God's " mere good pleasure from all eternity " — and the church only, were radeemed by his blood. A universal redemption, and an endless hell of un- saved sinners were doctrines utterly I'epugnant to his sense of God's justice and the Redeemer's merits. A universal salvation appeared to him to be opposed to the doctrine of election, and its collateral doctrines, as well as subversive of morality and virtue. He bowed his knee before his Heavenly Father, and fervently implored his grace, light, and guidance, that he might be preserved from falling into error ; not forgetting to commend to the tender mercy of the Great Shepherd and Bishop of souls, the individual who had so displeased the Church as to render it necessary for them to withdraw from him, and who, as he greatly feared, must have made shipwreck of faith and a good conscience. By this devotional exercise his agitated spirit was somewhat calmed and tran- quilized, and he retired to rest with the resolve, that he would understand the merits of Murray's case, and the cause for which he suffered ; not doubting that the Church would be found to have acted for the good of its members, as well as for the glory of God. (To be continued.) A WORD TO CHRISTIANS OF EVERY CREED. Beloved Brethren, — we are called by the gospel of the grace of God, to be " followers of God, as dear children,'' and to walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God, for a sweet-smelling savour. Seeing that this is our special calling, we ought therefore to be found loving one another with pure hearts fervently. It is our duty — it is more, it is our interest. It is every man's highest interest to love every other man as himself. We can recognize no opposition between our duties and our interests. Our God and Father has not made our duties to lie in one direction, and our interests in another, so that we must turn away from the one in order to attend to the other. From the beginning of the world till now, it has been the great work of the devil, the father of lies, to persuade men that it is not their interest to do what God would have them to do ; and those who feel and act as if their duties and interests clashed with each other, do so because the devil has so blinded their eyes, that they cannot discern what their true interests are. True love has its sorrows as well as its joys. The deepest of all sorrows is the sorrow of wounded love. There is no sorrow like Christ's sorrow: "His visage was so marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men.'' It is well that we should count what loving one another is to cost US ; lest beginning to build we be not able to finish, le.st love should make demands upon us that we did not calculate upon ; and therefore will not be PORT NATAL. 2d prepared to meet. Yet, on tlie whole, it is best to love. Tn being called to love, we are not called to serve a master who sends any a warfariiig upon their own charges. The joys of love are greater than its sorrows — if not always so, just now, yet we are persuaded that the joy will outlive the sorrow. This is Avhat we all believe. I am not going to say anything that any Christian will controvert. We all believe that God will, some time or other, wipe away all tears from our eyes, if we be followers of Christ. Hotv the Father of the spirits of all flesh will do this, whether by making an end of the things which pain and grieve love, or in some other way, known or unknown, is a question upon which we are not at present to enter. But the sorrow, that is, the suffering of love, even while it lasts, is not to be regarded as an absolute evil. The evil is not in the suffering, but is in the evil tilings which cause love to suffer. The suffering itself is an indication of a healthy state of the inner man. It is only a well-conditioned spirit that can taste of these sufferings. The better the heart is, the more that the divine principles of Christ are developed in the heart, the more the sufferings of Christ will abound. It is the suffering of love, be it remembered, and love is the best thing ! for God is love ! But why sliould we shrink from love's sufferings, seeing that the capacity for enjoying love's eternal joys, is in the capacity for suffering love's moment- ary sorrows? Whatever gives pain to a spirit, the reverse of that thing must give pleasure ; and of what gives no pain, tlie reverse can affoi'd no pleasure. For example, were we so constituted that a brother's unkindness and hatred could not painfully affect our spirits, then neither could his kindness and love afford us any pleasure. The very thing that lays us open to be hurt by a brother's hatred, is that which makes us capable of receiving joy and pleasure from his love. If sin does not fill us with sorrow; then holiness, the reverse of sin, will not fill us with joy. Reflect upon it, dear reader, how can it? How was it that the elder brother in the parable of the prodigal son, was unprepared for the father's joy, which burst forth upon the prodigal's return ? How was it that he could not sympathize with his father's joy? The very thing that saved the elder brother from partaking in the father's sorrow for the prodigal, when away in the far country wasting his substance in riotous living, was that which made him incapable of tasting tlie father's joy, wlieu the lost one was found again. If the elder brother had been mingling his tears with the father's tears over the lost one when away, then, instead of finding him standing with- out wondering at, and even finding fault, with the father's joy, we should have seen this elder brotlier running after the father, rejoicing with the father, to meet his brother. Whatever we may think of this elder brother (and we have no wish to make him worse than he is), it is evident that he neither knew his father's heart, nor loved his brother ; for had he known the father, and loved liis brother through knowing the father, he would nat have murmured at the reception which his erring brother met with; he could have prophesied that the father would not frown his repentant child from his presence, and send him back to the land of famine to die there, but would receive hini with joy. Friends, that which is to solve our doubts and clear our inward sight, is love. Love is life ; and the life is the light of men. And, if we would love one another, not in word nor in tongue, but in deed and in truth, we must have the love of the Father revealed to our spirits, for the Father is the fire thafe must warm us. G. G. PORT NATAL. By the kindness of our highly esteemed friend Dr. Thorn, who has placed it at our disposal, we are enabled to present to our readers the following interesting communication from the pen of Mr. James Riddall Wood, the author of 26 PORT NATAL. "Angel Visits," and formerly the conductor of a popular literary journal in this country. As affording authentic information on the subject of emigration it is important. Mr, Wood left our shores in the autumn of 1849, and is not aware of the existence of the Vniversalist ; but he carried with him the same scriptural faith for which we count it our privilege to contend ; and while we rejoice to think that, in a distant land, he will not hestitate, as opportunity offers, to proclaim the gospel fact that " the earth is the Lord's and the fulnes^ thereof," we are persuaded also that it would afford him sincere gratification to know that he was the means of imparting pleasure and instruction to his friends at home. A second letter will appear (D.V.) in our next number. My dear sir, If I have not written to you earlier it has not been that I have forgotten you ; for the glorious truths, with which you stand indissolubly connected in my mind, have brought you to my recollection more frequently and with greater satisfaction than any or all else that I have left behind me. Of our voyage I can scarcely bear to think, owing to the suffering, mental and bodily, to which Mrs. Wood and the family were exposed. Before leaving the Downs a case of scarlet fever broke out on board, which proved rapidly fatal, and by the time we reached Plymouth several other cases made their appearance. Notwithstanding this, together with the fact that the number of children on board exceeded by twenty the proper compliment, two or three families more were thrust on board at that port, and the Government Inspector allowed the ship to proceed to sea after a day's demur. In a few days the fever spread, and one after another of the children of the passengers were consigned to the deep. My wife was very ill, and notwithstanding every precaution, four of my own children were attacked. In addition to my labour and anxiety about my large family, and my nephew and nieces, I had the onerous duty of chief constable thrust upon me, which required me to superintend the whole of the steerage passengers, to see that their berths were cleaned out daily, that their bedding was brought on deck whenever the weather permitted, &c. In the meantime the surgeon was quite unequal to his post, and whether it were from apathy or intense selfishness, I know not, but he grossly neglected the sick, and seemed afraid to administer medicine or medical comforts. In fact, upon my urging him one day on this point, he said, in excuse, that the disease assumed a form he never saw before, and besides he had sprained jis ancle and could not be expected to go round to see his patients. During this time the disease was progressing ; some families lost two children, one lost three, and then the father fell a victim to diarrliasa after some day's illness, the doc- tor only having once seen him. True, he prescribed for him upon my stating the symptoms, opium and brandy, and the patient at length sank, as I believe, from overdoses of opium. I took the prescribing for my own children into my own hands, and I am thankful to say they all recovered. We were, how- ever, called on to part with one dear little girl, the youngest but one, who (always delicate) could not bear the fatigues and privations of a voyage, and she gradually sank in a sort of decline witliout suffering much pain. Almost her last words were, " I want to go home."* We buried her in the blue waves * The accompanying lines in memory of my beloved daughter, Lizzy, suggested by the last words she was heard to utter, were written with the hope of affording some consolation to Mrs. Wood. ' I want to go'—' I w mt to go' Mid the hum of bees, and the linnet's song, From these scenes of noise and strife, And the scent of lovliest flowers. • Where the heart is sick with sights of woe And the waste of human life. ' I want to go' to my home of peace, With holy adections blest ; ' I want to go' from the heartless gaze There wicked men from fcroubling cease Of cold unfeeling eyes, And weary ones find rest. To the cherished home of other days And early sympathies. < I want to go' — and that plaintive cry Was heard in realms above, ' I want to go' the green fields among, When the Saviour hushed her latett sigh Wh«re I spent my infant hoxirs, In the bosom of his love. PORT NATAL. 27 of the Atlantic in lat. 5 18, long. 30 49, in the "sure and certain hope of a glorious resurrection'' when "the sea shall give up her dead.'* During the remainder of our vo^'age (of 14 weeks), deaths were constantly occuring, and on our arrival many were landed sick. In all we lost eighteen on the voyage, and five have died since. In'addition to this, we had a fearful calamity off the Cape of Good Hope by the washing overboard of two of the apprentices in a heavy gale of wind. The ship was at the time phmging fearfully, and running at a fearful rate before the wind, under close reefed maintopsail and forestaysail. It was mid-day, and the sun was shining brilli- antly, although most of the passengers were compelled to keep their berths, as there was neither sitting nor standing, when the hoarse cry rose amid the howling of the winds and the roaring of the waters, " Boys overboard !" striking dismay amongst the crew and passengers. The only thing was to bring the ship to the wind, an operation of no little peril. Before this was effected the two poor fellows were lost sight of. When last seen, the elder (about twenty years old), was sustaining the younger, and the albatrosses were hovering close overhead ; indeed one or two of the passengers say they distinctly saw one of the albatrosses pounce down upon them. With the exception of a tropical thunderstorm, during which the vessel was struck by lightning and several of the crew and passengers were slightly injured, we escaped further disasters. On our arrival we found new troubles ; for, instead of Mr. Byrne's agent being there provided with temporary dwellings for our reception, he was up at Peter-Maritzburg, and we were set on shore about sunset, two miles from the town of D' Urban, without bed or bedding, and in the midst of the rainy season, the rain just begiiming to fall for the night. With one child on my back, and Mrs. Wood having the baby, we set forward, having brought all the younger children with us, and left my two eldest boys and two eldest girls on board to see after the luggage, and it was, owing to the weather, four days before they could be landed. D Urban we found to consist of a few mud huts (dignified here by the name of " wattle and dab") scattered among the bushes on a vast plain. Being dark and wet, we made to the first light, and were told that we should not get shelter, as there was not room for the emigrants who had pi-e- cededus; we were, however, refeiTed to the hotel, to which we wended our way, and found it to be still only a "wattle and dab,'' although it boasts of a billiard room. Here we saw some of the young men, our fellow-passengers, who had engaged every available space, and we were compelled to sally forth again. Leaving Mrs. Wood and the children under a bush with the umbrella, I proceeded to look out for lodgings, and after an hour succeeded in obtaining a table for Mrs. Wood and baby, and another for the little ones to lie upon, under the shelter of a " wattle and dab." The next day I was considered extremely fortunate in getting a "wattle and dab" for a month, at 2^. per month. It was neither larger, better finished, nor cleaner than an ordinary Irish cabin. Here we were compelled to lie on boards lent us by the landlord till our children brought the bedding from on board, and about a fortnight afterwards I got my tent ashore, under which I am still living until our house is finished which I am building with the aid of my son and a single Caffre, to whom I pay 5s, per month and two pints of maize per diem. 'I'hat you may form some idea of a " wattle and dab" I may just tell you how we proceed. Having fixed upon a site, my son and I sally forth into the bush with the Caffre and cut down trees sufficient for our purpose, which, being prepared, we hire a wagon (drawn b)' from twelve to sixteen oxen) to bring them in. These we plant about three feet deep and two feet apart for the outside walls. We then get branches or bamboos and interweave with these something after the man- ner of bleaching hedges in England ; upon this we lay a coating of clay, followed, when dry, by a coating of earth from the outheap, and over this a coating of cow-dung. This is white washed and the walls are completed. A3 a protection fi-om the weather (for the "wattle and dabs'' soon separate with wet), I am running a verandah round, and the whole is thatched with rushes, 28 PORT NATAL. which we pet from a swamp in the neighbourhood. The floors are dabbed like the walls. For the first few months these erections look neat and com- fortable, but they soon require patching. Little did I think two years ago that I should become the architect of my own house of which I sometimes feel inclined to boast, but at which my friends in England would, I fear, be dis- posed to smile. In consequence of Mr. Byrne's agent informing us that he was not prepared to locate us, we are detained liere, wh4ch is a sad business for the emigrants, as they are spending their little all, which was intended to enable them to cultivate their respective allotments. We are told we shall get our allotments to which we are entitled in virtue of our passage money ; but it may be some months first, as the matter will in all probability, be referred to the Home Government. Finding this to be the case, I obtained situations for three of my children, by which they will be able to support themselves. I opened an evening school in my tent, and Mrs. Wood a day school, and she has now got six scholai-s, and I five young men, who are learning mathematics, arithmetic, and French. Mrs Wood's terms are 6s. per month, and mine 5s. per month. After I had been open a fortnight, a merchant kindly offered me the use of his store (a large " wattle and dab" until I get my own house ready. I hope to get employment for the day as soon as my house is finished, as I have had one or two jobs already in drawing and calculating average papers, &c. My nephew and nieces have got employment ; the two latter as nursery governesses, and the former as teacher at Peter-Maritzburg. Of my prospects here I cannot speak with much certainty at present. I hope, in a short time, to be able to get forward, and shall be glad to have occasion to communicate such intelligence. Much misrepresentation is abroad respecting Natal ; the good has been enlarged and exaggerated, the evil has been altogether kept out of view. The climate is certainly delightful, although much warmer than has been represented ; but the temperature is kept down by the fine breezes which almost invariably blow during the day. We are now at the end of the rainy season, and during the greater part of the time, have lived in a tent, which I was advised in London to bring out; and certainly it has been of great service. The occasional hurricanes have tried it, and we have sometimes expected that it would be blown away ; but thanks to our Heavenly Father, we remain all safe. The country is most beautiful in many parts, assuming a park-like scenery, with gentle undulation of fine grass, spot- ted with clumps of trees, so arranged as to give a most pictm-esque effect. The soil is capable of producing plants of both the temperate and tropical regions. The cotton tree, the mimosa, gigantic cacti, aloes, the castor oil plant, tobacco, are found growing wild in the bush, with many other plants which in England require the greenhouse. Among the evils of the colony I may mention the bad water, although this is confined to D'Urban alone ; the abundance of serpents, the tigers, elephants, Szc. which, with alligators, render a residence in a lone district, upon a river, sufficiently unpleasant. Then we have the Natal "tick,"' an insect which buries itself in your flesh unless you extract it in time, producing very annoying sores, called Natal sores, something like boils in England. As to cotton-grow- ing, I fear the strong winds will be against it ; and the difficulty of procuring available labour will render it, at present, a hazardous enterprise. The abun- dance of insects is another drawback ; for it appears that many seeds, particu- larly those of slow growth, are eaten up ; hence wheat has not been found to succeed, although some parties allege that it will do better at a distance from the sea. Provisions (except meat) are dear. Flour 6d. per lb. ; the coarse black sugar of Mauritius, 6d. per lb. ; butter, 16(1. per lb. ; milk, 4d. per quart. ; tea, 2s. 6d to 3s. per lb. ; beef 2d. to .'3d. ])er lb. ; mutton, Gd., when it is to be had. Pumpkins, Indian meal, &c., are generally cheap ; but at presentovving to the influx of emigrants, the prices are somewhat high. CORRESPONDENCE. 29 And now, my dear Sir, I shall dismiss these matters, and hope to have something to say on better things than these when next I write. I have during the voyage, gone through the new edition of your " Three Questions proposed, and answered" and your " Dialogues on Universal Salvation'' with increasing delight. I meet with no one like-minded. Here we have a good number of Wesleyans, and some Churchmen. Each of these has a place of worship — both recent erections. Of these matters further particulars in my next. . Mrs. Wood and the family unite with me in kind regards and desire to be remembered to all friends. With sincere prayers for the spiritual and temporal welfare of yourself and family, believe me ever, Yours very sincerely, Dr. Thorn. James Riddall Wood. CORRESPONDENCE. SHOULD TUE DOCTRINK OF UNIVERSAL SALVATION BE PROCLAIMED TO THE WORLD ? To the Editor of Ths Uiiivarscilist, Sir, — In No. X. of the Uiiiversalist i\iQrQ is a review of "Ireland as I saw it," by D. T.; and in this truly valuable review we find tlie following sentiment — " We object to the system of God's universallove being taught to the world at all." This sentiment was questioned by Anefazo, whose objec- tions we have in No. XII. Since their publication, Anefazo has received a letter from one of his most beloved brethren in the faith and hope of the gospel; the writer of which, in referring to the above senti- ment, says, " I quite'agree with D. T. in the sentiment you criticised ; as I think the doctrine of the salvation of all men one adapted for the joy and comfort of the be- liever of the gospel, and not for proclaiming to the world. Not that I would conceal it, or make any mystery of it ; but I would not make it a prominent doctrine to press on the attention of the world I do not think that you have brought forward a sin- gle argument at all to the purpose in your article. You have cited and quoted a number of passages of Scripture, which are addressed to professed believers in the Messiah, either before or after his advent; but the apostles nowhere in the New Tes- tament are recorded to have proclaimed to unbelievers that all men should be saved. They proclaimed forgiveness of sins to si?i- ners ; to those they were addressing they proclaimed the forgiveness of sins ; but they did not proclaim that Christ had died to save all men. I grant readily that this is true ; but they did not say so to the world. If they did, I shall be glad to learn whereto find the passage.... You speak of it being justifiable to parade before the eyes of unregenerate men then (in the days of Moses and the prophets, Jesus and the apostles), the universal love of God- Will you give me one passage of Scripture which shews this? The love of God to sin- ners is proclaimed openly and without re- serve ; but until a man sees God's love to himself a sinner, I care very little about telling him of his love to all men. The chances are, if I do, that he will see neither one nor the other ; but, instead of seeing God's love to sinners, he vfill contract some notion of God's indifference to sin." A7ie- tazo had written a reply to the above pri- vately ; but, it occurred to him, that there may be a number, both of real and nominal Christians, of the same mind as his dearly beloved brother; and the subject being one of first importance, he has resolved, with your permission, to answer his brother and his companions in sentiment, through the medium of your columns. In the first place then, let it be asked can the gospel of the grace of God be pro- claimed in its integrity, without proclaim- ing the universal love of God ? Now if this question is answered with no, as some think it must be, then the first proclamation of the gospel to any man, to all men who ever heard it, m^lst have been a proclama- tion of the universal love of God to the unregenerate. What saith the Scriptures ? In the last two verses of the first chap- ter of Genesis, we have a proclamation of the love of God to all men, and every creature that has soul or breath — an un- conditional and irreversible grant of every herb bearing seed, every tree bearing fruit, and every green herb, to man and the other breathing creatures alike — no exception. In this ma7i hath no pre- eminence above a beast ; all alike have a right to the things of this life. The next proclamation of the universal love of God is to the serpent in the garden of Eden : " And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed 30 CORRESPONDENCE. and her seed ; he shall bruise thy head, aad thou shalt bruise his heel." This was a proclamation of the gospel — of God's universal love. Did not the woman un- derstand it to be so, when, in beholding her first-born son, she said, " I have gotten a man, the Jehovah ?" Was the serpent, were Adam and Eve regenerate when this was first proclaimed to them ? Was it not a proclamation of God's universal love to the world ? The whole of the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament is nothing more nor less, nor else, than a true and divine testimony of the unlimited love of God to men, and of the enmity of the seed of the serpent — the enmity of men to God. Again, — God preached the gospel to Abraham, proclaiming his universal love saying, " in thy seed, (which is Christ) shall all families of the earth be blessed.'' Abraham believed that what God had pro- mised he was able also to perform, and it was counted the same as if it had been actually performed. He saw the day of Jesus when he would be set forth a pro- pitiation for the sins of the whole world ; when the righteousness of God in perform- ing his promise and oath would be declared for the remission of sins. When this pro clamation of God's universal love was made to Abraham, there is no proof from Scripture that, before he first heard it, he •was regenerated. Nicodemus was probably a professed be- liever in a Messiah to come ; but he did not believe in Jesus of Nazareth as the Mes- siah, for Jesus said to him, " Ye receive not our testimony." Nicodemus was not born again when Jesus proclaimed unto him the universal love of God, saying, " as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up ; that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that who- soever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God sent not his son to condemn the world; but that the world through him, might be saved." John, iii. 14 — 17. The serpent in the wilderness was a figure of the human nature of Jesus Christ upon the cross, by which the enmity of human na- ture was slain, nailing it to his cross ; by which both Jews and Gentiles were recon- ciled to God, and peace proclaimed both to those afar off and nigh. The old man — the seipent — satan, or human nature, was cru- cified with Christ — was bruised — cast out. And, having been planted together in the likeness of the death of Christ, we shall be also of his resurrection. Eph. ii. 15, 16 ; Rom. vi. 5; Col. ii. 14. He who denies that God's universal love was proclaimed to Nicodemus while in an unrcgenerate state, surely does not understand the true meaning of John iii. To a multitude of both Jews and Greeks Jesus said, " I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me." These Jews most pro- bably professed to believe in the Messiah ; but they did not believe that Jesus was the Christ, therefore were not born of God — were unregenerate ; and to these was the universal love of God, in the sal- vation of all men, proclaimed. At another time, Jesus said to an assembly of these unregenerate Jews, " I came down from heaven not to do mine own will but the will of him that sent me. And this is the Father's will who hath sent me, that of all those he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day." Now we know, that the heathen have been given to Jesus for an inherit- ance, and the uttermost ends of the earth for a possession — yea all things are de- livered into his hand, and God wills that all men be saved. All this is assuredly done by him who came to do the will of God ; for all power in heaven and on earth is given unto him. Is not this a proclamation of the unlimited love of God ? The Apostle Peter, when addressing those who denied the holy one and the just — who killed the Prince of life, pre- ferring a murderer to him, declared to these bloody men, these unregenerate murderers, that this same Jesus whom with wicked hands they had slain, was he who had fulfilled all things, which God before had shewed by the mouth of his prophets should be fulfilled, by him whom the heavens must receive till the times of the Restitution of all things, which God had spoken by the mouth of his holy prophets since the world began (Acts, iii. 18), &c. Is not this a proclamation of God's uni- versal love, to the unregenerate ? More- over this same Peter preached that God is no respecter of persons, and had taught him to call no man common or unclean. Paul, when at Antioch, in the audience of a great multitude of contradicting and blaspheming Jews and idolatrous Greeks, not knowing of one regenerate man amongst them, proclaimed unto them God's universal love. " Be it known unto you that through this man is proclaimed imto you the forgiveness of sins." The Jews understood it to be a universal pro- clamation, and could not bear the idea of sinners of the Gentiles being forgiven, who were possessed of no worthiness in them to deserve such love. Again Paul, at Rome, for two years expounded and testified the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of the law of Moses and out of ithe prophets; and receiving all that came unto him. There need be no doubt, he preached the Gospel, and consequently the universal love ot God; nor can we safely conclude that all who came to him were, before they came, born from above. After all — to be really consistent — those who object to the system of God's univer- sal love being taught to the world, must also object to the putting into the hands of the unregenerate who can read, the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, CORRESPONDENCE. 31 except " with caution and a certain degree of reserve." Is it possible that any man can see God's love to himself, a siniier, who does not see God's love to all ? The possibility of this may be doubted. There is a great difference between the expres- sions, " God loves and forgives sinners," and " God loves and forgives all." In the one case, there is a possibility that God may love and forgive sinners, and yet neitherlove norforgive me; while, in the other, there is an assurance that / am loved and forgiven, because he loves and forgives all. He who sees not that God loves and forgives all, may love God in a certain sense ; but it cannot be with a perfect love, a love that castelh out fear which hath torment. IVe love him bccausehe first loved us. 1 Jno. iv 19. It is possible that in some things Anetazo may have gone to an extreme. He speaks as to wise men ; judge ye what he has said. Most Limitarians have so guarded the door of faith that it is impossible that any can enter in because of the terrible guard — neitlier do they themselves enter ; but remain in outer darkness, doubts, and fears. Most Universalists are not ashamed to con- fess that tliey are the saved of the Lord, and ready to give a reason of the hope that is in them with meekness ; but a few of them seem to be afraid of showing to the uncircumcised in heart and ears, the gold, silver, and precious stones, of the heavenly Jerusalem ; and the glory, light, and unlimited love of the Lamb who is the Temple of it lest these Babylonians should abuse the holy things, and profane them in the worshipping of the idols in which they delight themselves, even in worshipping them' selves. Had the gospel contained anything like a command to men to do or believe anything as a condition of their salvation, it were not only vain but absurd to parade it before the unre- generate ; but the gospel being simply a pro- clamation of what God hath done and will do in manifesting his universal love, let every guard and shadow be cast away, and the true light allowed to shine in the darkness — though still, as in the days of John, the darkness compre- hendeth it not. With love to all whom God loves, and especially to all who love God, Yours sincerely, Jan, 11th. 1851. Anetazo. To the Editor of " The Universalist." Sir, — The question whether the doctrine of universal salvation should be proclaimed to the world is as interesting as it is nnportant, and I am glad to find that your pages are open lor its discussion. The interests of morality, we may be sure, are never opposed bv the declarations of God respecting his grace ; and, if we know anything of the truth, we know well that the grace of God which bringeth salvation to all men, teaches us that, denyitig ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, and righteously, and godly in this present evil world. If the reviewer of Balch's " Ireland as I saw it," who appears to have a lively apprehension of the opposition of the gospel to all the native tendencies of man's fleshly nature, fears pro- claiming the doctrine of universal salvation to the world, I would ask on what ground the Almighty is justified in revealing his glorious purpose at all ? If the wicked man who glories in hissham*, can derive any encouragement to live in iniquity from the knowledge of the fact that all are saved and shall be hereafter eter- nally happy, may not the very elect find out, likewise, that this is its tendency, and be, themselves, beguiled into sin? For the gospel, I take it, in its relation to human character, and conduct, is the same to all i and wtierever received its appropriate effect (the etiect proper to its nature) must discover itself. The grace of God can only be made the minister of sin by those who pervert it ; and if men will pervert the gospel (as they did in Paul's time) the fault lies at their own door. And what, poor sunken sensualist, does it say to thee ? That thou shalt be happy I that thy empty coffers shall be replenished ? that thy blunted powers shall be sharpened so that thou mayest use them with a keener relish in pursuit of thy fancied good? that thy clouded intellect shall be cleared in order that thy perceptions of those abominable objects of thy sinful in- dulgence shall be more vivid ? that thy broken constitution shall be reorganized, and indued with the vigour and freshness of youth ? Think- est thou that this is the gospel t that this is the universal salvation for which we plead ? Poor wretch! Thou hast already eaten of the fruit of thine own wayS ! thou dost already turn from the bitter cup thou hast mingled for thyself! and the gospel with its universal sal- vation has nothing for thee wherewith thou mayest indulge for one moment in (what thou art now proving are thy bitter) pleasures. It promises thee nothing but the destruction of all that is filthy and impure. Know, tliat sal- vation is salvation from sin; and thou wilt only be happy as thou dost find that thou art crucified unto the world and the world to thee. And thus would I speak of the doctrine of God's grace to the guilty, with pity for my fel- low sinner, and yet with confidence in the cer- tainty and universality of salvation. Salvation is nothing more nor less than the utter destruc- tion of human nature, and the investiture of every being who has borne it with the divine nature. 'X'he one is to be superseded by the other : mortality is swallowed up of life. D. T. in his review of Newman; &c, has most forcibly dwelt upon the diametrical opposition of that which is spiritual to that which is natu- ral or carnal ; and, as affecting universal man, he will not deny that the doctrine of universal salvation is the most transcendent — the climax of all spiritual truth. I will submit to his con- sideration, and that of your readers, a few ex- tracts from a work which I doubt not is justly esteemed by your readers generally, and whose authority, as accordant with Scripture, will be admitted as decisivft. " The glad tidings of a salvation which is free, which is present, and which is ours, must be presented under every aspect, and man must have every opportunity of opposing it." Tliom's Three Grand Exhibitions of Man's enmity to God. p. 190. " That test was to proclaim and make known, as a matter of fact, that righteousness and life everlasting are, in Christ Jesus as second Adam, man's portion — every man's portion." Ibid, p. 192. "One thing. Papists and Protestants, Church- men and dissenters, [I do not know whether D. T. be enlisted under the banner of any of these parties], all cordially agree in : they all hate, and authoritatively stigmatize as false that present salvation of the whole human race in Christ, the second Adam, which is the grand divinely revealed fact, 1 Cor. xv.22, and which constitutes the gospel. Luke ii. 13, 14." Ibid, p. 255. " Let every man, to whom the interests of morals and the good of society are dear, with. 32 REVIEW. out distinction of sect or party, lift up his voice, and if necessary exert his arm likewise, in op position to such a daring outrage on the cha- racter of God." Ibid, p. 221. •' But the gospel ! The declaration that God, in Christ, loves all mankind freely, certainly, and for ever ! The proclaimed fact that eternal life is God's gift, and the creature's present, eternal, and indefeasible enjoyment! Towards this let no toleration be shewn; to this let no quarter be given. Let it be run dow^n ; let it be obliterated from the earth by the common consent of men of all sects and parties," &c. Ibid, p. 225. Thus does this eloquent writer put words Into the mouths of "Jews and Getr- tiles, Roman Catholics and Protestants, Soci- nians and Calvinists, clergy and laity, the profligale and the serious." See p. 224. I am unwilling to think that D. T. would adopt such a sentiment himself. The writer of the work we have quoted evi- dently makes the proclamation of Univer8.\l Salvation to the unregenerate the sine qua no7i of the third grand exhibition of man's enmity to Godj and I think he is right. I am. Sir, Fulham, Yours respectfully, Jan. 21st, 1851. James Johnson, REVIEW. '* Election no exntse for Ufans Sin, but rather a motive to Holiness, By The Rev. Ninian Bannatyne, A.M. Free Minister of Cumnock." Reviewed by James Nicol, Cumnock. 1844. It was a well-known axiom of antiquity, and has been acquiesced in by the moderns, that poeta nascitur, no7i Jit. That is, unless a man be endowed by nature with the poetic temperament, and be actuated by overpowering poetic aspirations, it is in vain for others to try to raise him to the rank of one of the muses' favourites, by conferring on him any kind or amount of education ; and equally in vain for himself to hope to succeed, by the longest and closest application to the practice of the rhyming art. Every true poet must be able, it may be with some modification, to adopt the language of Pope, and say — ■ " I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came." The principle of innate capacity and propensity, to which we have just been adverting, is applicable to more things than poetry. Peculiar natural apti- tudes, we have reason to think, characterise all human beings. Some possess an instinctive courage which qualifies, and, circumstances favouring, prompts and disposes them to brave the perils of land or sea. Some appear to be born with a mechanical turn of mind, which almost necessarily shapes out their fiiture sphere of action ; and which, in its higher forms of constructiveness and comprehensiveness of intellect, assisted by education, produces our military and civil engineers — our Vaubans, our Smeatons, our l^rindleys, and our Stephen- sons, In others, again, there is a natiu'aily refined power of analysis, and a closeness and accuracy of observation, which in Academic groves, surrounded by all the means and appliances of learning, and backed by industry, lay the foandation of the ripe and universal scholar. Profound metaphysical and logical powers, other things conspiring and co-operating, produce from time to time, an Aristotle, a Leibnitz, and a Locke. And so of other natural tenden- cies. Not that all men have the means and opportunity of following out the native bent of their minds. Alas ! this is, in but too many instances, counter- acted and frustrated. Mistakes committed by parents and guardians, mis- apprehension of one's own capabilities, and the chilling influence of penury, are constantly the means ol persons being placed in circumstances completely antagonistic to tiiose in which by nature they are fitted to excel. All that we mean to contend for is, that in each man there is some peculiar faculty or capacity, by which he stands distinguished from his fellows; and that it is on the due and industrious cultivation of this, his best prospects of success in life depend. Nay, fartlier, that sometimes — might we not be justified in saying, often ? — even in spite of circumstances tending to repress and prevent its mani- festation and growth, so strong and over-mastering is the peculiar mental cliaracteristic of the individual, as to enable it to burst through every restraint, assume its proper place, bring f )rth its richest fruits, and draw towards it the gaze and admiration of mankind. We have been led into the preceding train of thought and observation — not, certainly, very novel — by a consideration of the case and experience of our dear, worthy, Christian friend, Janus Nicol. James was born a ciilic. He has the foundationsof this distinctive rank ELECTIOX NO EXCUSE FOR MAN's SIN, ETC. S3 and character laid deep in his mental constitution ; and its elements are so thoroughly interwoven with the very warp and staple of his faculties, that we doubt if, under any circumstances, he could have altogether suppressed their manifestation. He might, to be sure, have been nothing more than the village oracle. He might have hved and died content with being the shrewd and racy "Town Clerk of Ephesus,'' of the " Glasgow Reformers^ Gazette." Or, in the hands of a few private friends, his masterly lucubrations might have remained unheeded : read, perhaps, at first, with avidity, and then, like the productions of many otiier able men, consigned to oblivion. But James Nicol would have been essentially a critic, notwithstanding. And from his writings, rude and crude as they are — disfigured but too frequently as they are by marks of hurry, and exhibitions of bad taste — individuals of superior discernment, attracted by the fresh, just, pithy, original and profound observations in which they abound, and able to separate the gold from the ore, might have enriched their own minds, and might it is too probable, without due acknowledgment of obligations, have contributed valuable additions to that stock of ideas and sentiments, which constitute the common literarj'^ property of mankind. To our friend, Mr. Nicol, it is due to state, tliat he has enjoyed few or none of the advantages of education, in that sense in which the word is convention- ally understood. Refinement and refined society he has, nearly all his lifelong, been estranged from. The fields of elegant literature he has had little time, and still less inclination to cultivate. His knowledge he has acquired, and his energies he has put fortli, in a great measure without any definite plan or purpose. Such disadvantages, however, serve but to render his native super- iority the more conspicuous. God has endowed him with faculties of a peculiar kind which, in the degree to which they meet in him, are rarely to be encoun- tered even in literary and polished circles. Were it allowable to do so, he might with truth boast of being animated by more than "ae spark o' nature's fire." Keen, discriminating, sagacious, he sees in a moment into the very pith and marrow of any case that may be submitted to him. And as there is direct- ness in his discernment of its merits, so is there directness also in his mode of dealing with its difficulties. Candid and straightforward in the extreme, he disdains having recourse to those round-about and tortuous expedients which worldly policy dictates. He meets his adversary, face to face. Should the cause withstood by him be weak, its hoUowness in an instant he exposes. Its arguments, by a few plain, well chosen and unanswerable, facta, he confutes. Let even a web of special pleading and sophistry be woven for its defence, after having analysed its texture, and disentangled its intricacies, he finishes by tearing it to tatters. Should wickedness, however, be superadded to weak- ness, woe betide him who ventures to step forth as the champion of such a cause. On him is brought to bear the whole weight of our friend's moral disgust and indignation ; the lightning of heaven's denunciations against evil is made to flash terrors into his guilty soul. Unsparing ridicule, stinging sarcasms, and withering invectives he is prepared to employ in evei-y case, where circum- stances seem to call for them. Not that roughness and severity are invariable characteristics of Mr. Nicol's style. To play the critic is his delight. And it is pleasing, as well as instructive to observe the calmness, gentleness, and dignity — the perfect ease and power, without uttering a single haisli expression — wiih which lie can succeed, when he chouses, in damaging and destroying an adverse cause. The great defect of our author is that, fertile in resources to excess, he has never yet thoroughly learned the art of grubbing up weeds, and pruning excrescenses ; that riding the highly mettled charger of his own buoyant and exhaustless activity, he seems scarcely ever able to know when to rein in. His, indeed, is one of the richest and most exuberant minds of the critical genus, which it has ever been our lot to meet with. To James Nicol cannot by any one who is acquainted with him or his writings, be denied the possession of genius. Respected, however, as Mr. Nicol is by us on the score of mental and moral VOL. II. c 34 REVIEW. superiority, ahd abounding in proofs of this as does the little tract now lying' before us, we should not on this ground alone have deemed ourselves justified in giving to him and his production a place in our pages. His clear-headed- ness, innate vigour of soul, restless activity, shrewdness, sagacity, critical acumen, and comprehensiveness of vision, might have been observed and admired by us, without drawing from us any public notice of their existence. To the hero-worsliippers — the adorers of mere intellect — we should, under ordinary circumstances, have left his high qualities to be found out and appre- ciated. But James Nicol, besides being a man of sense and penetration, happens also to be a christian. To him, it has fallen by lot, (2 Peter i. 1), and yet according to the divine purpose and sovereignty, (Rom. viii. 29, 30), to know the truth as it is in Jesus, 'J'herefore, it is, that we not only love him, but publicly speak of him. Long accpiaintance with the author of the " Review of Bannatyne's Sermon'' personally, by correspondence, and through the medium of mantiscripts on the subject of religion submitted to our perusal, enables us to say, that his know- ledge and attainments in theology, using that term in its best sense as signify- ing t/w character of God revealed in the scriptures, are such as to indicate that of the teachings of God's Holy Spirit, he has been in no small or stinted degree a partaker. A brief abstract of his religious history may not be unac- ceptable or uninteresting to our readers. Reared early in life, among what are denominated popidarly in Scotland the Cameronians, M^Millanites, or True Blues,* he adopted their views, and im- bibed their prejudices. But he inherited also their honesty and independence of character. With them, be studied the scriptures in the light of the "Westminster confession of faith," and " Catechisms larger and shorter;" and with them, he determined resolutely, through c/ood report and through bad report, to adhere to covenant obligations which he regarded as binding on the people of these realms. Such was the opening which, imder God, and in direct contrndiction to its own restrictive tendencies, led afterwards to his emancipation Irom sectarian thraldom. Having, while still young, been con- fined to bed for several years by a disease of the hip-joint, our reviewer availed himself of the leisure thus painfully aiTorded him, to indulge much in reading. The habits and tastes then acquired have never, since his recovery, forsaken him. Reading has for nearly half a century constituted his chief recreation. Not that there has been much variety in his topics. Theology has always been his favourite branch of study. Especially, that portion of it which enters into the controversies that, in the course of last century, agitated the Scottisli Church and nation. He has made himself intimately acquainted with the discussions, which were occasi(med by Mr. Boston'sf republication of the " Marrow of Modern Divinity;" (1717 — 1730); with Mr. Glas' expulsion, and his works; (1728 &c) ; with the causes which led to the secession of the Messrs. Erskine Wilson, Fisher, and MoncrieH', in 1732; and, above all, Avith the writings of the Rev. James Hervey, particularly his "Dialogues of Theron and Aspasio," — the awful castigation given to these, and to the published sentiments of the popular preachers in general, by Sandeman, in his acute, clever, and sarcastic "Letters," — and Cudwortli's postlnimous defence of the views of the deceased Rector of Weston-Favell. (1755 — 1760.) Various other works illustrative of this, and of otlicr controversies of the ])eriod, were perused by Mr. Nicol in * The strictest l)y far of our Scottish Presbyterian sects, which adheres with inviolable con- stancy and Jidelity to the " National Covenant," ITiSl, and the " Solemn League and Covenant," 1()43, and wliicli, considering the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland, to be bound by covenants to God, in the same way as the children of Israel of old were, has all along refused to acquiesce in the llevolution Settlement of Presbyterianism, in KiOO, as Erastian. Their own appellation is, "The Reformed Presbyterian Churcli." See them, and their notions, travestied in Sir Walter Scott's " Waverly," when speaking of "the gifted Gilfillan," and his followers. The great poet and novelist, whose delight it was to revel in the lictions of cliivalry and romance, had no sympathy with the noble, manly, straighforward, and persevering, although, it must be admitted, narrow-minded, impracticable, and somewhat unscriptural Covenanters. f Author of the celebrated "I'ourfold State." Likewise of "Memoirs," "Tlic Crook in the Lot," &c. ELECTION NO EXCUSE FOR MAN's SIN, ETC. 35 succession. He read Archibald M''"Lean's shrewd and suggestive treatises. He made himself acquainted with the differences subsisting between the sect of Baptists which owed its origin to that clear-headed man, and the Sande- maiiians. And, having examined into the doctrines and discipline of the Scotch Independent Churches, in connexion with the late Mr. Dale, of Glas- gow, he finally joined them.* From twenty to thirty years he continued a member of tlieir body, living under the influence of a species of modified Sandemanianism. At last the works of John Barclay, of Edinburgh, were put into his hands. Through their instrumentality, he was enabled to see the more excellent loay which the scriptures themselves teach and develop, in re- gard to the sinner's hope towards God. Other religious systems, even the best with which he had been previously acquainted, he now discovered had been inculcating, in one way or another, a conditional scheme of salvation — that is, a salvation dependent, in whole or in part, on something to be accom- plished by the creature himself. 'I'lie gospel, he was now enabled to perceive, might be as completely nullified by works of faith, labours of love, and patience of hope being made evidences to ourselves of personal state, and thereby sub- stituted for the perfect work of Jesus Christ — tlie sole foundation of hope towards God — as by all those appropriating acts of faitli, so much insisted on by the more serious portion of the popular clergy, which he had long before regarded with abhorrence. Barclay, trampling underfoot all creature righteous- ness real or fancied, and turning his back on all pretences to superiority on the part of one creature over another, directed him at once and exclusively to Christ's salvation as perfect — to God as appropriating us to himself by the manifestation to our consciences of this truth — to eternal life as not offered to us, but unconditionally bestowed upon us, solely through the death and resur- rection of God's well-beloved Son — and to our interest in heavenly blessings as not resulting from our belief, but as having existed anterior to, and being pro- ductive of our belief. Salvation certain, because secured to us in Christ Jesus, was, this man of God shewed, the doctrine of scripture.f 'J'he fulfilment of every condition of life everlasting by the Redeemer himself — the acceptance of sinful man as righteous in the beloved — were he shewed, not problems which human beings themselves were called on to resolve, not hypotheses which by some hocus pocus of their own they were to convert into trutlis, but facts actually ^existing, and to every child of God divinely revealed. To the scrip- tures alone he pointed as proclaiming these and kindred topics. In the blaze of light poured by the written word of God into the mind of every believer, are divine truths alone capable of being apprehended, and are they actually a])pre- hended. Ascribing to revelation alone all our divine knowledge, Barclay shewed that the same scriptures which bring against us a charge of guilt as one with Adam, the transgressor, discharge us from guilt as one with Jesus Christ, the righteous ; that the same scriptures which make us acquainted with death as the wages of Adam's one sin, also make us acquainted with eternal life, as the gift of God to us, through the one righteousness of Jesus Christ our Lord. (Rom. v. 12 — 21.) Sweetly and powei-fully did these scriptural views fall upon the mind of Nicol. Prepared in some respects already for their reception in consequonce of previous spiritual illumination, it was God's good pleasure to carry them home to his conscience by means of the heavenly light and evidence which from themselves beamed forth. A certain salvation, estab- lished in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ alone, by whose destruction of sin and death every condition of tlie enjoyment of heavenly blessings by us had been fulfilled and exhausted, and by whom as reigning the heavenly blessings themselves are freely bestowed, henceforth became our author's glory. From this, his transition, after a while, to a view of Clirist as spiritual Adam, and as thereby the saviour of the world (1 Cor. xv, 22), new- * " Inghamite " is the term applied to these Churches in England. + The whole constituting, althou^'h unconsciously on Mr. Barclay's part, an anticipation of one of the phases of the doctrine of " Divine Inversion." 36 REVIEW. creating the unregenerate, through having previously new-created the bride, the Lamb's wife, (1 Cor. xv. 22 — 28; 1 Tim. iv. 10; Rev. xxi. 1 — 5, with Gen. ii. 21 — 24, iii. 20, iv. 1, 2, v. 3 ; and Gal. iv. 4), was easy, and in a divine sense, natural. Thus, not by human learning, and not by laborious trifling in the study of ■what are denominated the evidences of Christianity, (one of. those delusions by which Satan but too frequently succeeds in drawing aside the eyes and atten- tion of men from Christianity itself, and in perpetuating his sway over them, 2 Cor. iv, 4), was Mr. Nicol brought "directly into contact with the scriptures, and was his mind pointed to their essential doctrine, the salvation of Jesus Christ. Not that; the truth in its fulness burst upon him all at once. On the contrary, he was left for years amidst much darkness — was made to experience the impossibility of mere man either acquiring or communicating the know- ledge of divine truth — and was thus at last brought personally and practically to comprehend what is implied in the declaration, they shall all be taught of Ood. (John vi. 45.) To him, it pleased God in due time to reveal the Saviour. Not that Saviour, whose work is dependent on ours — not that Saviour, who will bring us to glory, if we will but permit him — as fleshly- minded religionists suppose. But that Saviour who hath saved us with an everlasting salvation — who does not find, but makes us willing in the day of his power — and who in his gospel, revealing to us what he himself is, and the righteousness and life which in him we possess, is thereby at once and for ever superseding all self-righteous notions aiid actings of ouis: — cleans- ing our consciences from guilt by the sprinkling on them of his own precious blood, and by the jjower of his resurrection, filling us with joy as well as peace in believing. How sweet, how instructive, how edifying an experience like that of James Nicol. It exemplifies in the history of a single individual the essential nature and progress of spiritual light. Beginning with certain elementary convictions of heavenly truth, introduced into the mind by God himself, through the in- strumentality of his word, it is carried on by more enlarged communications, on God's part, of the understanding and belief of the same. (Eph. i. 18 — 20, iii. 14 — 18; Coloss.' i. 9, iii. 16.) Sometimes human writings or controver- sies on religious subjects, and sometimes the scriptures themselves, constitute the exciting cause of attention being first directed towards certain divine truths; but in every case where spiritual illumination either originally, or in any of its more advanced stages follows, the effect is due solely to God himself having condescended, by means of his written word, to bear testimony to the conscience of the individual. (1 John v. 1, 9 — 11.) Revelation, or the sulistantial wisdom of God, is always wherever divine truth is seen to be what it is by shining into the mind with its own heavenly lustre, superseding and destroying, so far as it extends, the reason or shadowy wisdom of man. (1 Cor. ii. 9 — 16.) With no other species of knowledge or light, intellectual, moral or religious, can the liglit of the knuivledrje of God, as it shines into the heart, i7i the face of Jesus Christ, be confounded.* While confirming those views of God's character as the Creator of the universe, and Punisher of the guilty, which even fleshly mind can apprehend, and by which men totally i^'uorantof the gospel are, often powerfully influenced, spiritual light consists in the opening of the eyes of our tmderstanding to see God as having new created us in his own Son, through whose blood we have the free forgiveness of sins, and through whose resurrec- tion we are made partakers of glory, honour, and immortality. And so far from spiritual light being indebted to the contiiuiance of nature's darkness, for any portion of its brilliancy and splendour, it is as the antagonist and destroyer of darkness, that at every step of its progress it becomes visible by shining into the mind. God is light, atid in him is no darkness at all. (1 John i. 5.) Against ^darkness, therefore, of every kind and in all degrees, divine light wages eternal war ; over darkness, until darkness in the fulness * 2 Cor. iv. 6. ELECTION NO EXCUSE FOR MAN's SIN, ETC. 37 of heavenly manifestation be finally swallowed up, it is continually achiev- ing its triumphs. But it is doing more. Divine light cannot co-exist with light of any inferior description. It supersedes nature's light, no less than nature's darkness. It supersedes the light which feebly dawned forth from Moses' dispensation, no less than the dark clouds of shadowy ritual observances, and the thick |gloom of legal threatenings which brooded over it, (2 Cor. iii. 7—11.) Light shining into the mind, through faith in the scriptures understood, by means of the teaching of their divine author, is thus not only manifestative as all Ught is (Eph. v. 13) but siu-passingly and supereminently so. Compare Acts ix. 3, and xxvi. 13, with I Cor. ii. throughout, 2 Cor. iii. 12—18, iv. 1—6, 1 John i. 5, v. 1—11, &c. It is of the nature of self-evidence. And, to the degree to which it enters into the mind, it is such self-evidence as leaves not the possibility of a mistake. Making inroads continually upon the realms of darkness, by the increased swallowing up of darkness in light, it bears testimony, by this very fact, to its divine origin. Fleshly mind, it may be, occasionally mistakes its own erron- eous assumptions and reasonings for heavenly light; but the light which shines from God himself, through the scriptures, being true and heavenly, neither de- ceives nor allows the possibility of deception. By this light of God's word was James Nicol led on. And in his privilege it has been given to others to share. The divine perfections displayed in Jesus Christ, as these are recorded in the scriptures, have been revealed to them ; and in the light of the perfections thus made known, have they been enabled to see their own personal interest in them. And truth after truth, still Au-ther illustrative of these perfections and of their interest in them, having been from the same scriptures, by the spirit of truth, made to enter into and take possession of their minds, their path, like that of the Just One, their head, resembles the inormng light, which shineth more mid more unto the perfect day. _ As with divine light, there is combined divine love, so by increasing love is increasing light accompanied. One necessary effect of which is the painfully humiliating effect upon the mind of all divine illumination. When light from above first enters into the understanding, it is as destructive in some measure of previous darkness ; and as this heavenly light augments, the darkness natural to man is more and more destroyed. But this very destructive process tends to bring under our notice the fact, that naturally our minds are the abodes of darkness only; and that as the destruction of darkness is entirely dependent on the progress and triumph of light, so, while light is imperfectly developed, there must remain in the mind vast regions of ignorance as to heavenly and divine truth, which God alone, by the light of his word, and the power of his spirit can destroy. While raised and enabled to triumph in God, by the manifesta- tion to him of the truth as it is in Jesus, the believer is thus, by the very same process cast down and humbled in self. Satisfaction, however, comes to him from the revealed fact, that as his Adamic nature is one of the principal pro- vinces of the realm of darkness, so in the complete and final destruction which awaits that present mighty monarchy, from him who is The Light, it is inevitably involved : he as delivered from the power of darkness, by being brought into the kingdom of God's c/ear 6'o« (Colos. i. 13), being enabled to rejoice in that destruction of creature self, through his new and divine crea- tion in Jesus Christ, which otherwise would have been to him an occasion of dismay. (Gal. ii. 20.) Exactly and thoroughly contrasted with all this, are reason's suggestions and views in the matter of religion, and is that species of progress in religious conviction and illumination, of which rationalists of all descriptions make their boast. To them, not scripture, or the revealed and recorded wisdom of God, but those investigations and conclusions of which the wisdom of man is capable, are everything. The foundation of this system has in every age been laid in the rejection and denial of what God hath said concerning himself as the creator and preserver of all things, and the jjunishcr of inicpiity ; or concern- ing his eternal power and godhead, as evinced in the things that are made. 38 REVIEW. and in his dealings with guilty man. For his own divine account of these matters, some onetigment or other of the human mind is substituted. That is, man ventures to give the lie to the God of truth. At this point commences, and henceforward proceeds, reason's progress in religion. Because that when ilietj knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful, but became vain in their imaginations, {reasonings) and their foolish Iteart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. (Rom. i. 21, 22.) And as the result, tJtey changed the glory of the uncorruptible God, into an image rnade like to corruptible man, (ibid. 2o) ; or, as it is afterwards ex- pressed, tliey changed the truth of God into a lie. (Ibid 25.) Thus Cain, and subsequently the Gentile descendants of Noah acted — thus from the very commencement of tlicir history the Jews acted — and tlius since the coming of our Lord apostate churches and individuals have acted. The principle com- mon to all of them has been, that to the suggestions of the wisdom of man, are always to be postponed declarations emanating from the wisdom of God. Keasoii's rushlight faintly glimmering in the cavern of their own dark and ■darkening understanding, alone commands their confidence. The night of the mind they deliberately prefer to its day ;* and the twinkling of the luminaries of human intellect, to the glorious beams of that sun of righteousness which, after the prelude of a long and gradually brightening dawn, hath at last ■arisen, with healing under its wings. (Mai. iv. 2.) Judicially are all such parties given up to themselves, and to believe their own lie. (2 Thes. ii. 11. Also Rom. i. 25 downwards.) Turning their backs on revelation, and glorying in the fancied discoveries of reason, they become the willing dupes of their own delusions. Darkened thereby as to their understandings, reason is the only light which they have to guide and direct them ; and as, pursuing the course upon which they have entered, the darkness of their minds necessarily increases, so does the light of reason appear proportionally to increase like- wise. That is, reason's light acquires a growing power and intensity, actually from the growth of mental darkness. The thick darkness as to divine and spiritual matters in which the votaries of reason find themselves more and more enveloped, or the constantly augmenting gloom of unbelief, and not, properly speaking, any actual and positive advance in reason itself, is what imparts to it the ominous lustre and brilliancy, by which in such a state of things it is characterised. It is, like the lurid flames which welcomed Milton's fallen spirits on their descent into Pandemonium, not light, but "darkness visible." Strange, however, and most melancholy the powerfully fascinating influence which reason, in the absence and rejection of revelation, exercises over the human mind.f Its manifestations are hailed as so many divine oracles. Its supposed exposure of scriptural fallacies, combined with its sub- stitution of human virtue for divine righteousness, and of the native energies of man's soul, for that strength which the truth as it is in Jesus alone can im- part, inspire the feelings and language of exultation and triumph. Jesus, God's eternal son, degraded to the rank of a mere creatuae — sin done away with, not through atoning sacrifice, but by a direct act of mercy — and man prejjared for glory, not through his oneness with Christ in his divine righteous- ness and life, hut through his own proud self-righteous cojjying of Christ's examj)le, constitute the religious aliment by which the most moderate rejectors of revealed truth, and most moderate devotees of reason, are nourished and supported. But, alas! in many cases, the darkening of the human mind, evinced by the existence and prevalence of such sentiments, does not stop here. While some, like Bunyan's Pilgrim, led astray by the advice of Mr. * Ye are all, says the apostle, the children of the light, and the children «/ the day ,- we are not nfthe nifjht. nor of darkness. 1 Thes. v. 5. Similar lan^'uajje occurs, Eph. v. 8. See the follow- ing context of this last-named passage, as well as Rom. xiii. 11— H. Nothing: can be more obvious from such texts, taken along with 1 John i. 5, &c. than that where the knowledge of (iod, imparted by divine teaching, through the scriptures is, there is day; and where such knowledge is not, there is night. t Sec Gal. iii. 1. ELECTION NO EXCUSE FOR MAn's SIN, ETC. S9 Worldly Wiseman, may be alarmed by the nature, and threatening aspect of the light to whose guidance they have hitherto entrusted themselves, and may thereby be deterred from proceeding farther; and while others may come to a stand-still, actuated by a vain hope of conforming, by subjecting the inspired language of scripture to the dictates of human reason ; bolder, and more wicked spirits without hesitation pursue their mad career and prepare them- selves for every extremity. The very danger to wliich they are exposing themselves, seems to quicken and stimulate them in their impious progress. Light, such as it is, stdl beams from the altar of their idol. Why should they not follow it? It may be, that, at every step they take, their difficulties are multiplied, and darkness they find to be fast thickening around them : but why not continue to trust to a guidance which has already made them inde- pendent of revelation, imparted to them a sense of liberty self-sufficiency and self-triumph, and enabled them in all the dignity of manhood to trample underfoot popular delusions? And, accordingly, still confiding in reason, they do advance. Under its animating, although baleful guidance, revelation ceases at last to be even a name — their own self-worship becomes complete — in the consciousness of personal virtue, the sense of guilt expires — future life and happiness constitute a boon, to which they declare themselves indifferent — and God himself, as a being to a level with whom they have elevated themselves, is in his promises, no less than his threatenings, openly set at defiance. Amidst this gross darkness — this complete night of the mind — with reason beaming forth fitfully and ominously, and f.iscinating its votaries to the last, (unless sovereign grace prevent), closes the scene. — Reader ! are you as taught of God through his word, and thereby possessed of a certain measure of spiritual discrimination, (Heb. iv. 12) able to distinguish between these two kinds of pro- gress, the progress of light, and the progress of darkness — the progress of Revelation and the progress of reason? Are you able to see, that they are thoroughly and necessarily opposed, the one to the other? After all that has been said respecting our author, our office as critics in his case is yet to begin. The review of Mr. Bannatyne's sermon, now lying before us, is clever, pun- gent, and on the whole most scriptural. Critical acumen, it is evident, is our author's forte. And well prepared to detect error, and shew up anti- evangelical statements in the light of divine truth, does he approve himself to be. Poor Rannatyne is but a child in his hands. His shallow;iess and sophistry, and the inconsistency of his leading positions with the very first elements of Christian theology, are rendered visible in a moment. They are laid bare, indeed, by the hand of a master in Israel. No thanks, however, to o\u* res- pected friend for this. Taught by the scriptures, and enabled thereby to bring his naturally acute intellect to bear on the subject, the paltry and flimsy nature of Mr. B.'s composition, it cost him scarcely an effort to expose. An election to heavenly blessings which is dependent on creature doings and feelings, and which thus stands irreconcileably opposed to that sovereign and eternal election to salvation by God himself, which is through sanctification of the Spirit, and belief of the truth, it required not the vigorous arm of James Nicol to dash to pieces. Notwithstanding all this, we are bound in truth and fairness to say, that Mr. Nicol's review of Bannatyne. is far from being one of his happiest efforts. Our friend is capable of better things, and has actually achieved better things. Not a few productions of his, vastly superior to the present, have fallen under our own notice. Somehow or other, we cherish a strong suspicion that, as having served its purpose, he himself would not be particularly chagrined, should the " Review " pass into oblivion. Besides grammatical slips, transi- tions the exact c(;nnection of which with what goes before is not always imme- diately obvious, frequent exhibitions of coarseness, and a bitterness of spirit, tlie origin of which none of us who have any acquainance with the truth, and consequently with our own hearts, can have any occasion to guess at — we 40 REVIEW. say, besides these, the review is not altogether free from crotchets of the author himself, and passages to reconcile which with scripture requires sometimes explanation, and sometimes even modification. His tract, in a word, affords evidence, that although privileged to possess a large measure of spiritual illu- mination, he nevertheless, like all the other members of the church of God ■while in flesh, hioics hut hi part. Ever}' deduction made, however, the Review is an extraordinary performance. In it, we are at once and constantly brought into contact with the word of God ; and are made to feel liow powerful it is, even in spite of the weakness of the instrumentality by which it may be wielded, to the casting down of man's vain imaginations and the levelling and demolishing of Satan's strongholds. This is one of the very few human pro- ductions on the subject of religion, in which the universality of God's love to man through Christ Jesus is maintained in strict consistency with the sove- reignty of grace, as displayed in the election and elevation to the kingdom of the true, heavenly and spiritual church. Sometimes when reflecting on what looks like a waste of talents and energy, in the fact of the passage through life, unnoticed and imknown, and destitute of any commanding attitude, of such men as James Nicol, we have felt, in spite of ourselves, the intrusion into our minds of that mawkish and puling sentimentality so pathetically embodied by Gray in the well-known lines — " Full many a gem of purest ray serene," &c. But speedily have we been enabled, as believers in the revealed character of Jehovah, to rebuke and put away from us the impious, no less than unmanly thought. God, we are satisfied, never created any being, much less any human being, in vain. Each is answering some wise and holy end — each is fulfilling exactly, and to the uttermost, the purposes for which he was sum- moned into existence. James Nicol, as a resident in the obscure village of Cumnock, is just where he should be. Grant we may, speaking after the fashion of men, that differently educated, and differently situated, he might have sustained a loftier position, and filled, what in our apprehension, would have been a more befitting part. But how know we that such a position, and such a part, would have been in reality more important ? How know we, that, differently circumstanced, his career would have been more conducive than it has been, to the accomplishment of the highest and most glorious pur- poses? Nay, what if God, by means of the mass of natural and acquired talents which is allowed continually to run to waste, may not be pouring con- tempt on that which holds so distinguished a place in man's estimation, and is in so many respects the object of his idolatry?* All natural, as well as spiri- tual gifts, are of His bestowal ; and, possessed as he is of Almighty power, there can never be awanting for his service, at any time, any description or amount of human superiority. But the world is subservient to the church, and the things of time to the things of eternity. Human gifts, like all other human things, perish in the using. Under su£h circumstances, what more emphatic method of declaring practically the comparative worthlessness of mere human powers and attainments can our [heavenly Father be conceived to ado])t, than that of shewing them, not confined to a few, but existing in a state of lavish and apparently even indiscriminate profusion ? Were it not that there are well understood editorial secrets, and that con- sequently a sense of propriety seals our lips^ we could with pleasure have pointed to the many valuable contributions, with which the industry, activity, and Chris- tian knowledge of Mr. Nicol have, under an assumed signature, enriched and animated our pages. Much, howevei', do we question, if even the best of these — and all of them arc truly excellent — surpass in critical accuracy, com- prehensiveness of thought, and masculine energy of language, several which we have read, and wiiich still remam in manuscript. D. T. ■» I Cor. i. 2.'-)— 2;». THE UNIYEUSALIST. MARCH, 1851. THE GREAT OBJECTION TO UNIVERSALISM AND ITS ANSWER. The principal objection in the minds of professing Christians to the doctrine of the ultimate and certain salvation of all men, is its appre- hended licentious tendency. If this doctrine be true, it is said, men may do as they please ; whether they restrain their selfish inclinations and interest themselves in the welfare of their fellow creatures, or whether they are utterly regardless of the good of others and seek their own gratification by any means by which it may be attained, it will ultimately come to the same result, — happiness will be their des- tiny in eternity. It is not to be supposed that God does anything in vain, and that therefore he can have made a revelation of his proce- dure and purposes to man which can serve no good object. But this doctrine is useless ; for if it be true, the result would have been the same whether the knowledge of it now had been communicated to man or not ; nay, it is worse than useless, for it encourages men to throw off the restraints which even their own erroneous opinions might have imposed upon them, and thus has a tendency to produce great evil and misery. It is therefore utterly incredible that a being of supreme bene- volence should be the author of a doctrine ^attended with such conse- quences ; even if his purposes had been such as the doctrine indicates, he would at least have refrained from communicating the knowledge of them to creatures so constituted as are the human race. This is an objection, it will be observed, derived entirely from the supposed tendency of the doctrine, altogether irrespective of the ques- tion, whether or not such a doctrine is actually taught in the Scriptures as a matter of fact. And although the objectors would not avowedly rest their opposition to Universalism on such grounds, there can be no doubt that it is at the bottom of it, and that it operates not only in prompting them to that opposition, but also in preventing them from giving their due weight to those statements of Scripture in which the doctrine is announced, making them shrink from a candid investigation of the subject, and disposing them rather to put it aside as a thing which they privately wish, hope, or think may probably be true, but which it is advisable to say or even to think nothing about. The objection has been answered repeatedly, — it may have been, fully and sufficiently, though we have not met with such an answer as from its importance we think it deserves ; but often also, we are of VOL, II. H 42 THE GREAT OBJECTION TO UNIVERSALlSM AND ITS ANSWER. opinion, rather petulantly, carelessly, and insufficiently. We consider that it deserves a fair, full, and sufficient answer ; and, in the absence of any other, we shall endeavour to the best of our ability, to give it such an answer. We say that we think the objection deserves a full and careful con- sideration, because it is one which has great, nay the greatest weight, with even the fairest and most conscientious opponents of our cause ; and those who support that cause in the spirit of Him who was long suffering to his enemies and never weary in well-doing, ought not to spare pains in endeavouring to remove difficulties from the minds of others, upon points on which they themselves have none. The objec- tion indeed is not one which bears exclusively against Universalism ; but may be, and is brought against the gospel itself, even when under- stood as declaring only a partial salvation ; namely, that true, and only true glad tidings, which tells of God's unconditional love to man in sending his Son into the world to save sinners ; — to save them entirely, not to help to save, or put them in the way of saving them- selves. I'ut it bears still more sti'ongly when that love is held to in- clude as its object the whole human race. In considering the objection, we shall take for granted that we have stated our case in proof of the truth of the doctrine of the salvation of all men as a matter of Scriptural declaration, and at least silenced, if not convinced our opponents. We shall also take for granted that they acknowledge, verbally at least, the unadulterated gospel, — that Christ . Jesus came into the world to save sinners ; and hold that salvation is entirely of God's free grace or undeserved mercy, — that eternal life is the gift of God. When they tell us then that our doctrine destroys all motives to well-doing, we ask them what are the motives and sanctions to well doing which Christianity supplies. We have endeavoured to shew what these are in some articles lately published in this magazine ("True Christianity a Practical Religion,") and would just briefly state them to be — love for him who first loved us, — the love of God shed abroad in our hearts, devotedness to him who hath bought us with a price. Our opponents, we doubt not, will acknowledge these as the highest motives by Mdiich believers can be influenced. But their objection, at least if urged with reference to believers of the gospel, is inconsistent with this admission, for it is equivalent to saying that these motives and sanctions are quite insufficient to induce to well- doing ci to dfcter from evil, (indeed there is nothing deterring in them,) and that the only thing really efficient is the fear of incurring everlast- ing, never-ending misery. Perhaps they may tell us that with all Avho really believe and are assured of their own salvation they will be sufficient ; but that there are many who are weak in faith, not quite certain that they are believers, or not quite assured of their own salva- tion, and with whom accordingly such motives and sanctions cannot be sufficiently powerful. To this we can only say, that such men cannot understand the gospel ; with them the glad news is not that Clu'ist died for sinners, but that Christ died for believers ; or rather practically for such as can persuade or assure themselves that they are believers. Sueh we cannot recognize as believers of the apostolic testhnony ; but THE GREAT OBJECTION TO UNIVERSALISM AND ITS ANSWER. 43 whether their uncertainty respecting their faith and hope be great or little, we can only class them amongst unbelievers ; — it may be, very religious or very devout unbelievers. It is enough, in the first place, that we reply to those who profess to see the glad tidings proclaimed by the apostles as undoubtedly true, (and, as inseparable from that, themselves assuredly saved), that if the love of God be sufficient to constrain to well-doing, their objection so far is inconclusive ; as with them, on their own profession, there is no room for the fear of hell and no necessity for it. But there may be some, w^ho, professing to believe the gospel, have no doubt of their own salvation, and who may with truth urge the objection, and from experience both see and feel its weight. They may be assured that they shall be saved, and therefore feel neither necessity nor inclination for doing anything than indulge their own selfish l^ropensities, as whatever their conduct may be, it will make no dif- ference in the end. They cannot deny that they are commanded to abstain from evil, but the command is accompanied with no penalty, or with no sufficient one, therefore why should they attend to it ? They cannot but acknowledge that they are exhorted to walk worthy of the calling by which they are called, but as they gain nothing by doing so, it appears to them quite unnecessary. True, they are exhorted to do so from love to Him who first loved them, but love -which costs any- thing is to them too expensive ; it may be well enough to talk about, but they cannot afibrd to give it. They feel no such love, though it may be, they are not insensible to the feeling in regard to other things. And why is all this ? Simply, because such men know not the gospel. Professing to believe it, they totally misunderstand it ; their gospel is, that Christ died to save them, they being special favourites of heaven ; or, rather, that it was the will of God to save them, and therefore it behoved the Son of God to come into the world to do it. But this was not because " God so loved the world," but simply from an arbitrary determination to display his sovereignty ; it indicated. thereU)re, no love to them, and calls for none in return. These men know not what salvation is : — slaves to the law of their own nature, they seek only to. be undisturbed by any other law which might be opposed to its dictates, and know nothing of a desire to be delivered from its selfish tendencies ; slaves to sin they desire only to remain quiet, in ignorance of any law which brings the knowledge of sin, and have no wish to be animated only by that love which raises them above sin ; slaves to death, they flatter themselves that they have life while it is only the bliss of igno- rance, and they are strangers to that life which consist in the favour of God, and the knowledge of his character as revealed in Jesus Christ. Men holding such sentiments will, no doubt, act as they like, unre- strained or unconstrained by any other than worldly principles, anima- ted by nothing higher than selfish motives ; but they afford no illustration of the force of the objection to Universalism which is under considera- tion, as their plea would be the same whether they v.'ere Universalists or Partialists, and the objection equally applicable in both cases. It may be said however that it is not in reference to such individuals as either of the preceding classes that the objection has most importance, 44 THE GREAT OBJECTION TO UNIVERSALISM AND ITS ANSWER. but in respect to a much larger class who have no such certainty of bolief, or such confidence in their destiny ; in reference to those who either are avowed unbelievers or are doubtful of the truth of the gospel^ — either almost persuaded that it is true, or at least somewhat suspicious that it may be so. We shall, therefore, now direct our attention to the objection as it concerns such individuals. We have already stated that all such we must consider as unbelievers ; it may not be disbelievers, or men who positively discredit the apos- tolic testimony respecting the work of Jesus Christ, but at least men who are not certainly convinced of its truth. Only those who have such a conviction we can recognize as believers of the gospel, — as really Christians. But the vast majority of professing Christians we readily admit will not come under this description : they either under- stand more or less clearly the glad tidings of the apostles, and think them more or less probably true, or they put faith in something which is a misconception and perversion of the gospel of the grace of God. It is upon such as these, in all their varieties, that the doctrine of the ultimate salvation of all men is charged with j^roducing bad effects ; and it is our business now to inquire how much truth is in the charge, and how it is to be an severed. Those who consider Christianity as an imposture or a fable can only look upon the doctrine as a speculation, which they will regard with more or less favour according as it coincides or not with their own opinions or guesses. Such, however, in nominally Christian countries, are but few in number ; there are many more who are more or less doubt- ful of the truth of Revelation, and not without more or less suspicion that there may be more truth in it than they are willing to admit. Such a doctrine, as it is supposed to promise them impunity from pun- ishment, it is apprehended will be looked upon by them with favour and be productive of bad effects. And the same may be said of all who are in any degree doubtful of the truth of Revelation, even though their dou])ts may be unconfessed, and their profession that of believers. Then there are the very numerous class who hold a perverted gospel — tidings that a Christ came into the world to save some sinners, or to shew men how they may save themselves. Upon those of such who are satisfied that they shall be of the number of the saved, Universalism can have no influence ; tlieir motives will be the same whether it be true or not : on the much larger number of this class who are more or less doubtful of this, it is supposed that the doctrine will be productive of evil, by making them, in proportion to the credence they give it, careless as to the use of the " means of grace ;" as, if this doctrine be true, any labour or self denial on their part, any exertion of their talents, or any circumspection in their walk, will be thrown away. It is a balance of probabilites, and their wishes are in favour of the doctrine which is supposed to be most agreeable to them. Upon the minds of all such men the rival doctrines can only appear as invested with a greater or less degree of probability. On the one hand it is more or less probable that some who attain to a certain standard of works, or of faith as evidenced by works, shall be saved and all others condemned to everlasting misery ; on the other hand, THE GREAT OBJECTION TO UNIVERSALISM AND ITS ANSWER. 45 it is more or less probable that all shall be finally happy. The former of these is held by our opponents to be the doctrine the most conducive to the welfare of mankind as it imposes a useful restraint on their evil inclinations ; the latter to be a dangerous one as it relieves them from that restraint. Such influences can only be exerted on the minds of any, on the supposition that their belief in the doctrine, thoitgh it may be only that of probability, is at least so strong as to influence their actions. This accordingly we shall presume to be the case. It will be well to advert, in the first place, to the consideration of what constitutes the principal restraining and controlling influence on the great mass of mankind. This is public opinion; the voice of society at large, or of the particular section with which individuals may be more closely connected. Not that we would deny the influence of re- ligious opinion ; on the contrary, we believe it to be very great and extensive ; but on the majority it operates only as it is enforced and supported by public opinion ; or, more correctly, by those who lead and direct public opinion. Such men, then, it is contended, if they incline to believe that uni- versal salvation is true, will be released from useful and beneficial re- straint in proportion to the strength of their faith. We admit this to be true, but contend that they will also be so far influenced by grati- tude ; and, in proportion as their faith in the doctrine is imperfect, they will be kept in check by the fear that it may not be true after all. On the other hand it is maintained that those who have the fear of hell be- fore their eyes are under a powerful restraining influence, while the hope of heaven presents to them a stimulus to well doing, an influence con- straining to good ; in other words, the hope of reward and fear of pun- ishment are the most powerful influences on mankind for good, the absence of them tends only to evil. Now it is to be remarked that reward and punishment are purely and only selfish motives ; men actuated by such motives alone are influenced only by the personal advantages to be derived from con- ducting themselves in the way indicated ; deprived of these they would act no better than others who have no such motives, — who expect happiness without deserving it, or commit evil with the hope of impu- nity. The former would not do well if they were not to be gainers by it, they would do ill if they durst. They do well not from love to God, but from love to themselves ; they avoid evil not from fear of God, — reverence to his pure and holy character, but from fear of hell. Those on the other hand who believe that they and all shall be finally blessed, whatever selfish motives they may have in common with others, have not the hope of heaven for one to induce them to good, or the fear of hell to deter them from evil. So far then as the character of the motives are concerned those of the Partialist are low and selfish ; those of the Universalist, so far as he is actuated by the principles which the positive belief of the doctrine produces, are high and generous. Then again, Partialists in examining their own hopes of hapi^iness, are under the perpetual temptation to look with complacency upon their own actions, — to deceive themselves as to their value and impor- tance, — to be puffed up with pride at their own attainments. Represent 46 rORT NATAL. it as tbey may, whether they look to their good works as evidence of the sincerity of their faith, or examine the state of their affections to ascertain whether they have taken hold of Christ, one thing they look for, and that is something in oi ahout themselves, whether they attri- hute it to God's grace or not, to distinguish them from their fellow- sinners. They cannot, therefore, " examine themselves," they dare not do so candidly, they cannot run the risk of discovering that they are in imminent peril of '* never ending ages of unutterable woe." The effect therefore of the doctrine is to produce spiritual pride and phari- saical self complacency : from these, so far as the prospect of eternal happiness or misery is influential in producing them, the Univcrsalist, in proportion to his faith in his principles, is free. Or, if some more candid or less self-deluded than othei's, do under- take this self examination, and discover themselves to he in imminent danger of eternal misery, if not even certain of it, what are the effects ? Despondency, desperation, recklessness. Without God and without hope in the world, they say. Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die. Escape appears to them hopeless ; why then concern themselves about the future ? let them make the most of the present. Even in human affairs, the effect of punishment disproportionate to the offence has been to produce desperation ; and what can be so disproportionate as eternal misery for human crimes ? From these effects also the Uni- vcrsalist is free. He has no cause for such despair; he lias not this inducement to recklessness. D. W, (To be continued.) PORT NATAL. A SECOND LETTER FROM MR. JAMES RIDDALL WOOD. Z)' Urban, Port Natal, My Dear Sir, South Jfrka, 30th Sept., 1850. I seize the opportunity of a conveyance to the Cape to renew my correspondence with you, which has been neglected for some time past, owing to the struggles 1 have had to engage in since my arrival. 1 am thankful to say, that, witli the exception of an attack of dysentery on my arrival, I never enjoyed better lieaUh in my life. I walked up to Pieter- maritzburg, a distance of sixty miles, in two days, and back in the same time ; and never did I pass through a more beautiful country in my life. Of course it is very much in a state of nature, but the luxuriance of vege- tation exceeds my powers of description. It abounds in bucks, as the roe" buck, the springbok, and several other sorts; elephants are also numerous, and on the lakes tlie sea-cow. Cotton and indigo are indigetious, and in some places the sugar caiie : — then you sometimes come upon a settler's location like an oasis in this beautiful wild, (not desert), wiiere the pine- apple and the lemon and orange and banana, and other tropical productions are to be met with, beside the turnip, and cabbage, and potato of old England. As you pass along through the bush and over the table lands, the air is redo- lent of sweet scents from a thousand flowers; and the hum and chirp of a thousand insects mingle into one delightful harmony — so that it has the most exhilarating influence (m the animal spirits, there is everything around invi- ting you to settle, and cuUi\utc so grateful a soil. Then; arc, however, draw- PORT NATAL. 47 backs: the soil is as productive of weeds as of useful plants ; there are insects, 'against whose depredations yon will have to protect yoiu'self by watchfidness and care ; you must laboiir hard to clear the ground, and to keep it clear of weeds ; you must erect good fences to protect your crops from deer and strong cattle; kraals to shut out the hyena and the tiger-cat from your herds; but then these are the conditions upon which the earth is given to man — "in the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat bread," &c. It is well to know, however, that these animals never venture to attack man, unless first provoked : they instinctively fly even from the naked Kafir. When I last wrote, I was, with the assistance of Mrs. Wood, keeping school and getting occasional jobs from the only notary in the place. I have, how- ever, made some progress since that time, having entered into an engagement to become the manager for Mr. Feilden, son of the late Sir John Fielden, of B'ackburn; and as his estate is only three miles cflT, I shall continue to reside here. Mrs. Wood continues the day-school, and I the evening school, and in addition to this, I report for the "D'Urban " newspaper', and am now aboufto publish an almanack for 1851, a copy of which, when out, I will send you. We have had large numbers of emigrants arrived of late, and all either go on the land, or get into employ, except three who had formed drinking habits — who hang about the canteens as long as their money lasts. There is room for tens of thousands more, and the capabilities of the land are unsurpassed. Then the climate is delightful. During the last four months it has been win- ter, but more like an English May or June, and the air balmy and pure — so pure that at night you may distinctly perceive the relative distance of the stars from this planet — the nearest ones appear so — others appear more deeply embedded in the rich etherial blue, Avhile others again appear immeasurably deeper still. This I never observed in England: all there appear the same distance, differing only in size. As a cotton growing country, I do not think it will produce anything very considerable for some time, as the capital is wanting, and the supply of labour at the season for picking very uncertain, that being the time they generally spend at their respective kraals getting in their viealies. if any of your friends contemplate coming out, I would advise them to bring nothing but money. The market is glutted with English manufactures of all kinds, and prices of all things have been very much reduced in consequence : whereas money is so scarce, that parties are ])aying 4 per cent, per month, and giving security into the bargain; and yet I know many instances in which it pays the borrower well even at that exorbitant rate. So much for the things of this world. As regards the things pertaining to a better life, I find myself very much alone — among parties who are notoriously making a gain of godliness, or who are going about to estabhsh " their own righteousness, not submitting thena- selves to the righteousness of God." By the Last vessel we had a Mr. Camp- bell, (I beg his parcl(m, llev. I should have said), who is come out to establish a church in the interests of the Free Church of Scotland. He is preaching to- night 1 hear at the Wesleyan chapel : he preached there on Sunday, and, of course, was very urgent upon his hearers to become their own Saviours. I have met with two Johnsonians from Liverpool; one, a Mr. Holmes, who was shipwrecked in the Minerva, and who has a wife still in liiverpool. He has been obliged, in consequence ol his loss, to take the situation of teacher in the family of a wealthy Dutch Boer. J was much pleased with him — his know- ledge of the scriptures was extensive. He was formerly in the employ of the late Rev. W. Jones, author of a History of the Waldenses. He mixed with the Wesleyans, as he " felt it his duty" to do ; I cannot but feel it my duty to stand alone, though by so doing I incur the general disapprobation, and am thought to be exceedingly illiberal in consequence. This is however of little consequence, since I know it cannot be otherwise, than that minds imbued with fleshly views of religion should be hostile to those which are spiritual and divine. 1 am going through your " Divine Inversion " with greater care and 48 THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY AND THE DYING UNIVERSALIST. attention than ever I have 3'et been able to bestow, and find it to be indeed suggestive of an ahnost infinite series of resemblances and oppositions to be met with in the word of God. The bearer of this is Mr. Horwen, who was likewise wrecked in the Minerva, and who is a Johnsonian ; but from not having seen him more than once or twice on business, I have had no conver- sation with him on religious topics. He is returning home I fear with pros- pects blighted in consequence of the wreck ; although had the property been landed safe, I think it would only have helped to increase the glut in the market. Mrs. Wood and my family are in the enjoyment of excellent health and spirits, and all like the colony much. When you have a leisure hour I sliould be delighted to hear from you. My address is, " James Riddall Wood, D'Urban, Port Natal, South Africa." With my kindest regards to Mrs, Thorn and family, and to all friends meeting in Bold Street, I remain, dear Sir, Yours very truly, Dr. Thorn. James Riddall Wood. THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY AND THE DYING UNIVERSALIST. How should Universalism be opposed? is a question which some of our con- temporaries are answering by the tactics they employ to prejudice their readers against it. And what are their weapons ? We have already given a specimen from the Christian Witness ; and, in the Christian Treasury for February, we have another unmistakeable sample. These two Christians are worthy of each other ! They are not fools. They well know that an ounce of prejudice is more available than a pound of argu- ment; and that "a telling anecdote" will go a great deal further than a scripture statement, or any amount of Christian logic. We are unwilling, how- ever, to believe that their readers are so easily satisfied : we cherish the con- viction that many of them are capable of distinguishing between ^the true and the false in what they say respecting Universalism ; indeed, it appears to us that their intelligence and Christianity must be insulted by such abominable and barefaced misrepresentation of ^^ our most holy faith.'' " The Harvest Past, or the Dying Universalist, by J. S. Spencer, D.D.," is the title of the paper to which we allude. As usual, we have no name and no place : but we are favoured with the very satisfactory information that the event, which the writer narrates, took place " more than 16 years ago.'' After so far satisfying us as to the time, Dr. Spencer expresses his reluctance to commit to paper that which is so appalling, and the thought of which fills him with horror ; but he will yield to the solicitations of his friends. He states that he was hastily summoned to the bedside of a sick man, about 26 years of age. And this is the character he gives him : — " He was an industrious man ; prosperous in his business ; and, as a man of the world, bore a good character." This is not very discreditable : we wish nothing worse could ever be said of a professing Christian! We have more than once been told by men of business that they would rather have transactions with '* men of the world,'' than with those who make a profession of religion. Alas! that Christ slioidd be so wounded in the house of his friends! THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY AND THE DYING UNIVERSALIST. 49 " His father was a Universalist, and the son had imbibed his principles." The writer, however, does not attribute the son's industry, 'or prosperity, or his good character to his Universalism. Oh ! no ; his object is to show that Universalism is the parent of the worst of crimes and greatest woes. The clergyman found the young man in intense suffering, and in a state of despair. In vain did he attempt to administer consolation by setting before him the mer- cy and grace of God ; and, after some conversation, the young man '' vocife- rates," "'Mercy! mercy! that is what makes my situation so dreadful! I have despised mercy ! I have scoffed at God I I have refused Christ ! If God was only just I could bear it. But now the thought of his abused mercy is worst of all ! there is no mercy for me any longer ! For years I have refused Christ! My day has gone by ! I am lost ! I am lost.' " The Universalist despise mercy? Scoff at God? Refuse Christ? Could bear God if he were ow/y just? Abuse mercy? and die in despair? The picture has not even the slightest claim to being a bad caricature of a Universalist. We do not deny that such words were uttered ; and it is quite unnecessary to show tliat a Universalist could not utter them : but we know that there is a religious (?) teaching which is calculated to produce something very much like them. But here is more to add to the account. The young man goes on, " The eleventh hour is past ! This is the twelth hour. God's time of vengeance has come ! . . , .1 have loved the world only," &c. His father comes into the room, and, " in a tone of hatred and anger," the son upbraids him with, "You have been my worst enemy ! You have ruined me. You led me to disobey God, and neglect the bible ! You led me into sin when I was only a little boy," &c. We cannot quote more ; the father appears to be everything that is bad, and the son shortly dies in despair. The impression conveyed by the whole narrative is that Universalism is the enemy of both God and man : opposed to religion, to morals, and to happiness ; and terminating in ruin and despair. Dr. Spencer (whoever he may be) must be either profoundly ignorant, or we forbear to characterize the man. We presume that the Editor of the Christian Treasury has a mortal hatred of Universalism ; for this is not the first "anecdote" he has published with a view of throwing discredit upon us. Upon us ? nay, upon Him who bore our griefs, and carried our sorrows ; upon Him who bore the iniquities of us all ; upon Him, who will see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied; upon Him who was called "a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners;'' upon Him, whom the ^ioMs of his day on earth deprecated because " Ae receiveth sinners." Well! we can afford to bear the reproach of Christian Witnesses and Christian Treasuries, and Christian Times* too, for our master ; since we have his com- pany and the animating words he uttered for our consolation, " Blessed are ye when men shall revile you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake." Let us live up to our privileges, and illustrate our principles in * A weekly newspaper, tearing this title, in animadverting on a recent sermon by a clergy- man at Oxford, after condemning many of his statements, discovers the climax of his error to consist in his exposing himself to the charge of Universalism, inasmuch as " there was no dis- crimination," &c. ! VOL. II, 1 50 IMPORTANT CONCESSIONS OF PROFESSOR STUART. our lives, not forgetting to pray " that all who profess and call themselves Chrutians may be led into the way of truth ;" and we need not fear but that we shall put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. Z. IMPORTANT CONCESSIONS OF PROFESSOR STUART. Professor Moses Stuart has long been one of the most influential writers in the orthodox ranks. With the Presbyterians his name is a tower of great strength, and a defence against all religious heresies. What then will be thought of the following article from his pen, pub- lished in the Biblical Repository ? " There are minds of a very serious cast, and prone to reasoning and inquiry, that have in some way come into such a state, that doubt on the subject of end- less punishment cannot without the greatest difficulty, be removed from them. "They commence their doubts, it is probable, with some a priori reasoning on this subject. — ' God is good. His tender mercy is over all the work of his hands. He has no pleasui'e in the death of tlie sinner. He has power to pre- vent it. He knew, before he created man, and made him a free agent, that he would sin. In certain prospect of his endless misery, tlierefore, his bene- volence would have prevented the bringing of him into existence. No father can bear to see his own children miserable without end, not even when they have been ungrateful and rebellious; and God, our Heavenly Father, loves us better than any earthly parent does or can love his children. " ' Besides, our sins are temporary and finite ; for they are committed by temporary and finite beings, and in a world filled with enticements both from without and from within. It is perfectly easy for Omnipotence to limit, yea, to prevent, any mischief which sin can do ; so that the endless punishment of the wicked is unnecessary, in order to maintain the divine government, and keep it upon a solid basis. Above all, a punishment wilhout end, for the sins of a few days or hours, is a portion of misery incompatible with justice as well as mercy. And how can this be any longer necessary, when Christ has made atonement for sin, and brought in everlasting redemption from its penalty?' " The social sympathies, too, of some men, are often deeply concerned with the formation of their religious ojiinions. They have lost a near and dear friend and relative by death ; one who never made any profession of religion, or gave good reason to suppose that his mind was particularly occupied with it. What shall they think oF his case? Can they believe that one so dear to them has become eternally wretched, — an outcast for ever from God ? Can they endure the thought that they are never to see or associate with him any more ? Can heaiien itself be a place of happiness for fhem, while they are con^ scious that a husband or a wife, a son or a dnu.glilcr, a brother or a sister, is plunged into a lake of fire from which there is no escape ? ' It is impossible,' they aver, ' to overcome such sympathies as these. It would be unnatural and even monstrous to suppress them.' They are, tlierefore, as they view the case, constrained to doubt whether the miseries of the future world can be endless. KINDNESS THE BEST PUNISHMENT. 51 " If there are any whose breasts are strangers to such difficulties as these, they are to be congratulated on having made attainments ahnost beyond the reach of humanity in the present world ; or else to be pitied for ignorance, or want of a sympathy which seems to be among the first elements of our social nature. With the great mass of thinking Christians, I am sure such thoughts as these must, unhappily for them, be acquaintatices too familiar. That they agitate our breasts as storms do the miglity deep, will be testified by every man of a tender heart, and who has a deep concern in the present and future welfare of those whom he loves. " It would seem to be from such considerations, and tlie like to these, that a belief in the future repentance and recovery of sinners has become so wide- spread in Germany, pervading even the ranks of those who are regarded as serious and evangelical men in respect to most or all of what is called Ortho- dox doctrine, saving the point before us. Such was the case, also, with some of the ancient fathers ;* and such is, doubtless, the case with not a few of our day." It really seems to us that the man who wrote that article must be leavened, to some extent, with the spirit and principles of Universalism. — Is it too much to suppose that he has strong doubts of the eternity of hell torments ? Star in the West. Priestcraft. — Priests above all people are naturally inclined to sectarianism ; they are accustomed to regard the Church as of higher importance than the Bible; according to them, Religion is not the work of God alone but of God and man together. Hence it is that the Priesthood, in every Christian sect, is that which divides, o^jposes, denounces, and excommunicates. It is tlirough the Priesthood that we have schisms, and we shall continue to have them so long as in the Church of Christ the believer is not placed befoi-e the minister, the spirit befoi-e the form, grace and faith before outward rites and observances. AchUli's Dealings with the Inquisition. KINDNESS THE BEST PUNISHMENT. A QUAKER, of most exemplary character, was distui-bed one night by footsteps under his dwelling, and arose from his bed, and cautiously opened a back door to reconnoitre. Close by was an out-house and under it a cellar, near a window of which was a man busily engaged in receiving the contents of his pork barrel from another within the cellar. The old man approached and the outside man fled. He stepped up to the window and reeeived the pieces of pork from the thief within, who after a little while, asked his supposed accom- plice, in a whisper, 'shall we take it all?' The owner of the pork said softly, 'yes, take it all,' and the thief industriously handed up the balance through the window, then came himself. Imagine his consternation when, instead of meetiing his companion in crime, he was confronted by the Quaker. Both were astonished, for the thief proved to be a near neighbour, of Avhom none would have suspected such conduct. He pleaded for mercy, begged the owner *" However it may be explained, it is a striking fact, that neither the Apostles' Creed nor the Nicene, nor yet the Thirty-nine Articles of the Episcopal Church express any belief in future misery, although they distinctly express a belief in future happiness. The Apostles' Creed closes thus:— 'I believe in the Holy Ghost; the holy Catholic Church; the Communion of Saints ; the Forgiveness of sins ; the Resurrection of the body ; and the Life everlastingi Amen.' " 52 ANOTHER AWFUL SUICIDE. not to expose him, spoke of ihe necessities of poverty, and promised faithfully never to steal again. 'If thou hadst asked me for meat,' said the old man, ' it would have been given thee. I pity thy poverty and weakness, and esteem thy family ; thou art forgiven.' The thief was greatly rejoiced, and was about to depart. — ' Take the pork neighbour.' 'No, no,' said the thief, ' I don't want the pork.' ' Thy necessity was so great that it led thee to steal. One half the pork thou must take with thee.' The thief insisted he could never eat a morsel of it. The thoughts of the crime would make it choke him. He begged the privilege of letting it alone. But the old man was incorrigible, and furnishing the thief with a bag, had half the pork put therein, and laying it upon his back, sent him home with it. He met his neighbour daily for many years afterwards, and their families visited together, but the matter was kept a secret ; and though in after time the circumstance was mentioned the name of the delinquent was never known. The punishment was severe and effectual. It v?as probably his first, it was certainly his last, attempt to steal. Young People's Mirror. ANOTHER AWFUL SUICIDE. We have often said that tlie doctrine of endless misery is one of the most fearful scourges under which society now suffers. A history of that doctrine ior hundreds of years past, would disclose scenes of persecution, sorrow, despair and suicide, at which the stoutest heart would quail. Who will write a faith- ful history? Who will show where the doctrine originated ? how it crept into the Church ? when it came to be considered essential to the orthodox faith ? how it has gone side by side with persecution? how it has filled men with wratli and bitterness against their foes ? how it has oppressed the tender, pious heart, di'iving men and women to despair, insanity and death? The following is only one among a thousand similar statements of facts which it makes the blood run cold to recite. Br. Whittemore, — I hereby announce to you the intelligence of a most heart- rending suicide, which occurred in this place on Monday last. The circum- stances attending it are as follows, and were communicated tome by the coroner wlio held the inquest. The unfortunate subject of this notice, whose name was Julia A. Chapin, of New Marlborough, attended a protracted meeting which has been in progress for a number of weeks in the vicinity where she lived. It was carried on principally by the Methodists. She was (to use their own expression,) hope- fully converted, and in tliis situation she remained until about two or three weeks ago, when she listened to a sermon from Matt. xx. 16 : 'So the last shall be first, and the first last ; for many be called but few are chosen.' From tl)is time the conviction seemed to fasten itself upon her mind that she was not ■■miong the chosen, and consequently there was no salvation for her. In vain did her friends endeavour to di>pel the delusion. She grew melancholy, con- tinually insisting that she must go to hell ; in which situation slie continued nntil the morning of Monday last wlien she rose from the breakfast table, took a razor which she concealed about her person, put on her bonnet, went oulun- CORRESPONDENCE. 53 observed, and was found in about ten minutes after, perfectly lifeless, having cut her throat in such a manner, as to cause her death apparently without a struggle. Respectfully yours, C. D. Palmer. New Marlboro', Mass., Nov. 24, 1849. Boston Trumpet. CORRESPONDENCE. SHOULD THE DOCTRINE OF UNIVERSAL SALVATION BE PROCLAIMED TO THE WORLD ? To the Editor of " Dear Sir, In the Universaust for Feb- ruary last (No. xiv) there is a let- ter from Anetazo upon the question whether the doctrine of Universal Sal- vation should be proclaimed to the world, in which he takes for his subject of comment, some remarks made in a private letter to him by the writer of this. The same reasons that induced him to give publicity to his comments in your Magazine have actuated the writer in requesting that you will give insertion to this reply. Trusting that you will do so, to avoid unnecessarily occupying your space, he will pro- ceed at once without any preliminary remarks to the consideration of tlie subject. "Anetazo" asks in the first place whether " the gospel of tlie grace of God can be proclaimed in its integrity without proclaiming the Universal love of God?" This he answers with a hypothetical No, and then draws the conclusion that the first proclamation of the gospel to any man or to all men who ever heard it, must have been a proclamation of the Universal love of God to the Unregenerate, and appeals for proof of this to the scriptures. We re- ply that the gospel of the grace of God is not properly the announcement of the love of God at all, and that Anetazo at the outset confounds two things quite distinct, namely the love of God and the grace or mercy of God ; the love of God being his goodness or benefi- cence in bestowing blessings on his creatures either as innocent or without any reference to guilt, his grace or mercy being his goodness in shewing kindness to guilty creatures, those who were deserving only of wrath — the objects of righteous judgment. He at once shows this by citing as his first instance God's bestowing blessings at The Universalist." the creation on innocent man and ani- mals, an exhibition of God's love cer- tainly, but not of his grace or mercy. He then cites " as the next proclama- tion of the universal love of God" the sentence on the serpent, the prophecy of the enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent and of its results. "This" says he " was a proclamation of the gospel — of God's universal love.'' It was we reply, the first announcement of the gospel or tidings of the grace or mercy of God, of his love to man guilty or deserving only of justice. That it was a proclamation of God's universal love to the world, so under- stood by Eve, is a pure assumption, and her observation on the birth of her first born,* suggested as a proof of this, only shows how egregiously wrong she was in any supposition respecting it she may have formed. There is no evidence how the prophecy was under- stood by our first parents ; in all pro- bability they understood no more than that it was a promise of future victory over the tempter, but how or to what extent, they could probably form no definite idea. Anetazo next proceeds to quote several other instances in which the gospel was announced to Abraham, Nicodemus, Jews and Gentiles, in order to prove that the universal love of God was proclaimed to unregenerate men. Now nothing could be further from our thoughts than to question the pro- priety of proclaiming the gospel to men who do not believe it ; indeed it is only to such that it can with propriety be proclaimed. To those who believe it we cannot proclaim it, as that would virtually be to assume that^they do not believe it. We may speak of it and comfort one another with the knowledge i of it, but it would be a contradiction »As given by Anetazo—" I have gotten a man, the Jehovah." 54 CORRESPONDENCE. to proclaim peace as glad tidings to those who have already heard the pro- clamation and found peace in believing it. We have already shewn that to identify the glad tidings of the mercy of God with the proclamation of the universal love of God to men is to con- found two things totally different, but as our object is not to gain a victory in argument but to educe and vindicate truth, we shall suppose that Anetazo may still contend, or perhaps may have meant from the first, that the gospel cannot be proclaimed in its integrity without proclaiming the mercy of God as effective towards the whole human race. He does not say so directly but his whole argument is founded on the assumption of this. It would have been more to the pur- pose had he proved this instead of ad- ducing ^evidence that the gospel was proclaimed to the unregenerate, a point which we never dreamt of questioning. After the case of Eve in support of his Universalism Anetazo quotes that of Abraham, referring to God's promise contained in the words "in thy seed (which is Christ) shall all families of the earth be blessed," stating that Abraham believed that what God had promised he was able also to perform, that he saw the day of Jesus when he would be set forth a propitiation for the sins of the whole world, &c. Who told Anetazo this ? How does he know that Abraham saw this? There is not the slightest Scriptural evidence that he saw any such thing, but much to indicate that it was highly improbable that he did. There is no probability that he had any distinct idea as to how all families of the earth should be blessed in him ; he could however with- out difficulty understand that he should be the father of many nations and that his seed should be as the stars of heaven in number ; and nothwithstand- ing the improbability of this, being without heirs at the advanced period of his own and Sarah's life, he believed God, being fully persuaded that what he had promised lie was able to per- form. (See Horn. iv. 16—22.) When Anetazo speaks of the gospel being proclaimed to Jews and Gentdes does he mean to say that it was stated in such a way that they understood the preachers to mean that the whole human race should be saved ? When he declares his Universalism to his neighbours they have no difficulty in understand- ing him and many of them are probably shocked at such a doctrine and reject it. But was this the case in New Testament times ? It is very clear that it was not. Jesus it is true spoke of having been sent to save the world, but it is equally plain that those who heard him, Nicodemus as well as others, did not understand what he meant by it, for until after his resurrection not even his own disciples understood what the salvation was, and afterwards not even they understood that it was to be proclaimed to the Gentiles. And how much greater must have been the ignorance of the Old Testament saints during the times that the knowledge of Christ was a mystery hid from ages and generations, and which in the ex- press words of the apostle (Ephes. iii. 5), " in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now re- vealed unto his holy apostles and pro- phets by the Spirit." That very Peter whom Anetazo refers to as proclaim- ing the restitution of all things was, after this, prepared by an express com- munication from Heaven before he preached the gospel to the Gentiles, nuich to the surprise and discontent of the Jewish believers. (Acts x, xi). In referring to Paul's preaching (Acts xiii. 38) Anetazo says that the Jews understood it as a universal proclama- tion ; probably they did, but he ought to recollect that a universal proclama- tion of (rod's love is not identical with a proclamation of God's universal or unlimited love. The Jews were offended that ani/ Gentiles should be saved, and required no Universalism to offend them : probably they would not have been offended with the doctrine of the salvation of all Jews. Perhaps Anetazo may contend that the gospel really means the salvation of all men, however men may misun- derstand it. This we do not dispute. But as in Apostolic times all did not so understand it, it indeed being gene- rally proclaimed by the tipostles as limited to those who believed it, it is clear, either that the apostles did not proclaim it in its integrity, or that it may REVIEWS. 55 be proclaimed in its integrity without necessarily suggesting the salvation of the whole human race. We should like to know which alternative Anetazo chooses. Anetazo says, that to be consistent, the writer, and those who entertain similar sentiments ought also to object to the putting into the hands of the unregenerate who can read, the Scrip- tures of the Old and New Testament, and farther that a few Universalists seem to be afraid of shewing to the uncircumcised of heart and ears, the gold, silver, and precious stones of the heavenly Jerusalem, &c. lest these Babylonians should abuse the Holy things, &c. Let us be clearly under- stood ; — the statement quoted by Ane- tazo respecting the propriety of pro- claiming the doctrine of the salvation of all men was as follows — " Not that I would conceal it, or make any mys- tery of it ; but I would not make it a prominent doctrine to press on the attention of the world." We contend for proclaiming the apostolic gospel, the glad tidings of God's mercy to sinners — salvation God's gift to the guilty. We should therefore have no hesitation and feel no inconsistency in placing the scriptures in the hands of unbelieving men, being convinced that this gospel has its due prominence there. And with respect to the precious stones of the heavenly Jerusalem we would remember the words of our di- vine Master, not to give our holy things to the dogs, nor cast our pearls hefore swine, and therefore we should not pa- rade before unregenerate men the uni- versal love of God. Again we ask Anetazo to give us one passage of scrip- ture which shews that this was done by the commissioned preachers of the gos- pel. But we should do as they did, or as they give us warrant to do. Now tliat all authority to denounce condemnation has passed away, we should declare the mercy of God to sinners, forgiveness of sins to the guilty, life to the perishing through Jesus the Messiah, openly, "without guard or shadow," or any kind of reserve, and until they see this salvation extended to themselves sin- ners, we should care very little to tell them of God's love to all. Anetazo has confounded the love of God with the mercy of God, — the pro- clamation of God's universal love with the universal proclamation of God's love, and the writer's objection to make universalism a prominent doctrine for proclaiming to the world with an ob- jection to preach the gospel to unbe- lieving men. He saj's that it is possible he may have gone to an extreme : we think that he has, and that his zeal for Universalism has led him to lose sight of the most elementary and fundamen- tal principles of Christianity, There isyetone passage in Anetazo's communication which we have omitted to notice, in which he speaks of the difference between the expressions, " God loves and forgives sinners" and " God loves and forgives all;" and there are also one or two objections, which the writer anticipates may occur to the reader, to the views he contends for. These he is desirous of examining be- fore concluding his comnnuiication ; but as he fears trespassing to too great an extent at one time on your space, he will include them in another letter, which he will be glad if you can insert in the next number of your magazine. Meantime he subscribes himself. Yours very sincerely, Feb. 10, 1851. • Ekdikalethes. REVIEWS. f/ie Infidel : a poem written in defence of revealed religion. By Edward Cock, of Stonehouse, Plymouth. — London : Palmer & Son, Paternoster Row. 1844. " Mediocridus esse poetis, non Dii, non homines, non concessere columnze.'' Thus wrote Horace nearly two thousand years since, recording the experience of past, and anticijiating the verdict of future generations. Far be it from us either to say, or insinuate, that Mr. Cock is an indifferent poet. On the contrary a careful perusal of the work now lying on our table 56 THE INFIDEL. has satisfied us, and a similar perusal must we sliould think satisfy others, that as a man of imagination, vigorous and cultivated intellect, and genius, the writer of "The Infidel" takes high rank, and occupies a commanding position. Men of no small name in the literary world might well be proud to have pro- duced such a poem. As to our poor selves, who are obliged to be content with trudging on leisurely along the pathway of plain prose, we should have given a vast deal to be able to write any thing, a twentieth part as good. But, alas! " The Infidel" is after all a failure. It comes short of absolute perfec- tion. And, therefore, in the Horatian sense of the term, and tried by the poetical standard which, in the stern severity of its enactments, differs materially from those gentler laws to which prose compositions are subjected, it bears on it the stamp of mediocrity. Having been read and admired, it is liable to be flung aside and forgotten. This is a result which, we confess, we deeply deplore. Honesty, whether associated with talents or not, is the object of our unqualified respect. A desire to draw attention to the Holy Scriptures, and to check that growing spirit of refined and literary scepticism, by which the past and present centuries have been so pre-eminently distinguished, is most laudable, and must enlist in its behalf the sympathies of all to whom the truth as it is in Jesus is dear. Above all, when the party presenting himself to the public in the capacity of an author, is endeavouring to clear away from the face of God's word doctrines of doubt- ful import, if not even human invention, by which hitherto its beauty has been marred, its glory obscured, and its progress impeded, is it possible to check" the eager and ardent wish, that one wielding spiritual weapons, and so engaged, may have God speed ? In these very predicaments stands our respected friend Mr. Cock. He is an honest man, — a sincere believer in revealed truth, and therefore an opponent of infidelity in all its varied forms, — and being a Univer- salist is solicitous that the Manichean doctrines of infinite sin, and infinite torments, may sink into those shades of eternal night, from which by the folly, misapprehensions, and perversity of human beings, they have temporarily emerged. He writes, in order that God may be glorified, and sinful man benefited by being awakened to a sense of the love borne by God to the world, in Christ Jesus. Can such objects fail to interest us? Can we help admiring the talents with which, in the case of Mr. Cock, they are prosecuted ? And, if unsuccessful in their accomplishment, is there one of us indisposed to sympathize witli the axilhor in those feelings which, as disappointed in his benevolent and Christian wishes, he must have experienced? Many causes might be assigned for Mr. Cock's failure. None of them lie very deep. Two, we may mention. Ungracious is the task which we have undertaken. But in a spirit of affection to our brother, as well as with due regard to our readers, we shall try to go through with it. The first cause of our autlior's want of success to which we advert, is that his work has evidently not been subjected to that process of careful and patient elaboration, without which no poetry, however excellent in other respects, can abide the test of ages*. Prematiir in nonum annum, was the maxim of ancient wisdom and experience. And Pope, as is well-known, has, in one of his Epistles embodied a lesson to the same effect.* By the way, the name of Pope reminds us that, in this respect, he himself practised what i»e preached. His produc- tions which lie was seldom if ever in a hurry to publish, he kept always lying past him : frequently revising them ; constantly re-touching them ; substituting one phrase for another, as taste or caprice dictated ; sometimes altering the alteration itself, and replacing it by a reading that pleased him better; and sometimes, e\en, reverting to wliat he had originally put down. Not mifre- quently did he erase a great deal of what he had composed, as either enfeebling the sense, or detracting from his general design. Some of his manuscripts, * And drop at last, but in unwilling ears, This saving counsel, " keep your piece nine years." Prologue to the Satires. THK INFIDEL. 57 especially those of his translation of tlie Iliad and Odyssey, are, from the nmii- ber and minuteness of his corrections, in seme places scarcely legible. Few, if any, of the words originally written, in certain cases remain. We wish that our dear friend, Cock, had but a little better imderstood the value of the lit- ura* Scepe vertere stylum is a precept, with which no poet,^-no author, we might say, who is desirous that his works shall be generally read and shall sur- vive him, whatever his aflTection for his mental progeny may be, will neglect to comply. t The second cause of Mr. Cock's failure is his choice of subject. If success in tin realms of poetry generally be a matter of the utmost difficulty and of rare attainment, success in poetry of the didactic kind is about the most difficult, and the rarest to be attained, of all. The superlative degree we might justly have employed without any qualification whatever, were it not that the Epic must be excepted. Success in it is proverbially next to impossible. The fact of every specimen of Epic poetry, except the Iliad and Odyssey of Homer, the ^neid of Virgil, the Paradise Lost of Milton, and the Inferno Purgatorlo, and Cielo of Dante, — may we add, the Lusiad of Camoens? certainly not the Pharsalia of Lucan, the Henriade of Voltaire, or the Messiah of Klopstock, — ■ having either passed into utter oblivion, or enjoying only a local and limited noto- riety, surely should be the means of deterring all, except the bold and pre- sumptuous, from making any future attempts in this department of the Muse. Unless, haply, some sublime genius, destined to eclipse all his predecessors, should in the course of God's providence in after times arise. Exci^pting the Epic, however, the Didactic, it strikes us, is the most unpromising field in the whole range of the poetic art, to the cultivation of which any unhappy wight can betake himself. How monotonous and heavy, how absolutely prosaic, is the writer in this line almost necessarily felt to be ! If " the good Homer some- times nods,'' who has not been conscious occasionally of an inclination to slumber over even tlie Ars poetica itself? And had not the splendour of Pope's genius and the versatility as well as rich exuberance of his talents, been evinced otherwise,^ would the " Essay on Man," or the " Essay on Criticism," great as their beauties confessedly are, have in any way contributed to his being placed as by the almost unanimous suffrages of contemporaiie^ and pos- terity he has been, so near the head of England's greatest poets? It is a tick- lish thing to adventure one's whole stock of literary reputation, in the cumbrous craft of a didactic poem. Dutch-built, and heavy laden, its weight has been sufficient to sink some of the greatest masters in the art — some of those who have been the most potent in the use of the Muse's enchanting spell. — Who, then, can be surprised to find that Mr. Cock, with talents and attainments of a high order, should form no exception to the general rule ? He is able, he is eloquent, he is from time to time powerfully impressive. If apparently paralysed some- times by the nature of his subject, it is but the more to evince the greatness of those powers, by which he is enabled to bear up under, and even to throw off the load by which he is pressed down. But in spite of all such efforts, we feel ourselves irresistibly impelled to wish, that to some other of the coy sisterhood, — some other of the "sacred nine'' — than her to whom he has addressed himself, he could have been led to devote his attentions. And this the more that, to the almost insuperable difficulties inherent in didactic poetry itself, he has chosen * Ev'n copious Dryden wanted, or forgot. The last and greatest art, the art to blot.— Pope. t The practice of frequent and trenchant correction has not been conlined to poets. J. 3. Rousseau's manuscripts shew tlie extreme fastidiousness of his taste; and seem to indicate that to retouching, retrenching, aud the unhesitating substitution of one phrase for another — in a word, to the incessant " use of the file" — as much almost as to natural genius, he owes many of the graces of his exquisite prose style. It is a well-known fact, that Mr. Roscoe, of Liverpool, the celebrated author of the Lives of " Lorenzo de" Medici," and " Leo the Tenth," was in the habit of sadly annoying M'Creery, his printei', by the frequency and minuteness of his altera- tions. For the sake of a phrase, or passage, whicli on reflection struck him as inaccurate, or inelegantly expressed, he has gone to the expense of cancelling a whole sheet. X As in his " Dunciad," " Messiah," " Rape of the Lock," "Abelaid and EloUa," &c. VOL. II. K S8 RKVIEWS. to add another, arising out of the particular topic, of wliich lie treats. We are sure that intentionally Mr. Cock is no servile imitator. His intellect is of itself too strong and too richly stored, and his feelings are too independent, to permit anything of the sort. And yet besides that feeling of monotony which, in the perusal of his poem, one cannot entii-ely shake off, one finds certain recollections constantly obtruding themselves on the mind. Is it possible to dissociate the Lemander of " The Infidel," and Alfred's able and happy ex- postulations with him, from the Lorenzo, and the remonstrances of the " Night Thoughts?" In stating the two facts which we have done — and more of a similar kind, Avere it necessary, might be adduced — we have assigned reasons suflScient to account to others, for our worthy and respected friend's want of success. But we confess that insisting en these, we have not satisfied ourselves. We consider Mr. Cock to have failed, on a principle which is not precisely of a literary nature. Readers may if they please view our objection in the light of a prejudice, or crotchet of our own ; but we must nevertheless be permitted to mention it. We dislike Christianity being treated of in the poetic form altogether. In- spired poetry constitutes one of the most glowing and glorious portions of the Old Testament Scriptures; but poetry, on the subject of religion, from unin- spired pens, is almost always, if not always felt by us to be out of place and keeping. Sometimes, even, it is positively nauseating. This is particularly remarkable in the case of the loftier pretensions of the muse. They almost necessarily involve language and ideas, certainly not according to godliness. A writer of religious poetry, be it Epic, Didactic, or Dramatic is in his style, descriptions, and allusions, more or less heathenish. He speaks more than half in the speech of Anlidod. Nehem : xiii. 24. Milton himself is no exception to this. His God the Father, and his Christ, have always, in their addresses, excited in us the offensive feeling of Dramatis personce, introduced on the boards of a theatre ;* besides also stii-ring up disagreeable recollections of their prototypes, the gods and goddesses, and reminding us of the other supernatural machinery of the Iliad and iEneid. We dislike invocations of the Holy Ghost in a work written for a display of the author's artistic skill, as we do invocations of the Muse. The former is, in every mind imbued with the slightest tincture of classic lore, invariably associated with the latter ; and to find the Divine Being invited to play the part which was formerly assigned to an idol of the human imagination, is of necessity to a Christian thoroughly disgusting. And yet if religious poems are to be written, and religious subjects treated of, accord- ing to the strict rules of art, how are such things to be avoided? Cowper, it must to his honour he admitted, is, on the whole, in his own poetry, free from the fault complained of. Our author, too, evidently felt that heathenish allusions were inconsistent with his main design, and accordingly has been sparing in his use of them. But they decidedly, it may be slightly, tinge his poem, not- withstanding. If epic or didactic poetry, on the subject of religion, must be written — why should it? — would that some man might arise, gifted with John Barclay's knowledge of tlie gospel and fervent love to God's revealed character but with more than Darclay's genius, and free from that coarseness, want of taste, and intense vulgarity by which his versification is disfigured, from whom some production worthy of his theme, and, if an Englishman, worthy of his country might emanate. | * We may tolerate, nay, even admire and applaud, in the Tragedies of jEschyltis, Sophocleg, and Euripides, what in the works of a professor of Christianity is absolutely intolerable. How melancholy to think, that tlie truly sensible injunction of ?L\\taX\\exi, Nee Dcus intersil, &c., Bhould have been so perpetually neglected, if not even trampled underfoot, by the nominal ad- vocates of a piner creed ! t Tbe spirited and not unfrequcntly spiritual etfusions of Watts, the exquisite taste and nameles8 grace.s of James Montgomery, and the rich radiance of evangelical truth which beams forth from the paijes of Cowper, are not without their charms for us. Nay, when enraptured by their glowing phraseology, we have been temi)tcrt sometimes even to overlook, if not forgive, the sad and serious blundering as to the simplicity of the gospel which, in the works of these deservedly eminent men, is constantly obtruding itself on our notice. Their manner almost THE INFIDEL. 59 Persons wlio have gone with us thus far, may be apt to think that, notwitli- standing our disclaimer at the outset of he article, we frate Mr. Cock's poem low. Such persons would do us, as well as him, a positive injustice. "The Infidel'' is a poem of very rare and superior, although somewhat irregular merit. Its versification, which is that of the Iambic ten-syllable line, is singularly liarmonious : beautiful descriptions abound in it; and, in the author's appeals to the heart and conscience, he is often remarkably felicitious and impressive. He has, besides, tiie happy knack of from time to time con- densing in a line or two, the most valuable axioms in morals, metaphysics, and theology. He does not in this imitate Young. Against being supposed to lay such a charge, we have already guarded ourselves. We, however, in reading Mr Cock's poem, cannot help being struck with a most marked resemblance, in the respect alluded to, between it and the "Night Thoughts." Not merely are the authors of both productions the combatants of infidelity and scepticism in their various shapes and disguises, and thus at one as to their subject, but both understand well the value of point and antithesis. In Young, fondness for these is, perhaps, not unfrequently carried to excess. Our author is more sparing, and therefore, in our apprehension, more judicious in the indulgence of his taste for them. His antitheses are often most admirable ; and the aphoristic form in which they are presented, very striking. Both autiiors have striven to track the monster, infidelity, to his most secret lairs and lurking places ; both authors have assailed him in his stronghold. His destruction they have aimed at, by having recourse to every species of weapons. Wit — argument — ridicule — indignant remonstrance — scripture. The one has em- ?loyed blank verse as the medium of his onslaught — the other, rhyme. If oung must be admitted to have carried oflf the palm of superiority, in this species of rivalry — supposing rivalry to be a fitting term to be applied to the distinct and independent efforts of men, who were not contemporaries, in the same intellectual arena — let it be remembered, that he enjoyed many advan- tages over onr author. He was first in the field ; his education was of a first- rate order; his was that academic and rural leisure, after which the sons of genius have so often sighed, and sighed in vain : he took time to elaborate his compositions: he published them piecemeal, thus trying the public pulse, and benefiting by public criticism: and, so far as objections to revealed religion had been started in his day, he may be said, in his statements of them and replies to them, to have exhausted the subject. Mr Cock, whose situation and circumstances have been, in almost all respects, the opposite of those of Yonng, has had, we suspect, to conflict with difficulties in the preparation and puhh- cation of his work, to which his predecessor was an utter stranger. Siiould not this, in the awarding of praise or blame by the critic, be considered? Young in the statement and enforcement of gospel truths, is sometimes — -we regret that we cannot say often — most happy. Witness, some of tliose magnificent passages — those glorious outbursts of eloquence and genuine feeling — by which, especially, the fourth book of the Night Thoughts is characterised. Although not always able to agree with onr friend, Mr Cock, in the religious views which he expresses — indeed, obliged now and then to condemn pliraseology which, however popular and conventional, is not according to the revealed mind of God — we cannot but deem him, on the whole, a much more scriptural and spiritual writer than Young. Some little progress in the knowledge of Him apologizes for defects of matter. Widely different is the case vritli John Barclay. It is his matter which atones for his manner. In spite of all the verbal drawbacks and imperfections — so great as frequently to inspire a feeling of uneasiness almost amounting to disgust — which detract from the value of his poetry, (not without indications of genius,) such are its scriptural richness and depth— so truly heavenly and divine is its subject-matter — that from time to time we delight ourselves, nay, absolutely revel, in tlie perusal and enjoyment of it. N.j:hing mawkish, cer- tainly, and but little that in a spiritual point of view is objectionable, does it exliibit. — Without exactly concurring in all that our dear friend George Gilfillan has said on the subject of rcli,'ious poetry yiand objecting to it on grounds far different from those to which he has so ably adverted, tlie feelings wliich he describes as having been experienced by him in reference to this species of oompositieii, havf often to the fullest extent been our own. 60 REVIEWS. whom to know is life eternal, we j\re^convinced Mr Cock has made, since he composed liis poem. Bishop Watson in his "Apology for Christianity/' and his "Apology for the Bible — the word apology, in both cases, being employed in its classical sense, and having a reference to the titles of works of Plato, Justin Martyr, and others — has endeavoured to bring down to popular apprehension, par- ticularly in that production of his which we have named last, the facts and arguments by which objections to revealed religion are met and obviated, and frequently even turned against those who have had recourse to them. " The Infidel " of Mr Cock is an attempt of a similiar kind in rhyme. Its praiseworthy aim is to popularize, and render impressive, the main arguments by which scepticism is refuted, and the truths of scripture are established. Whether successful or not, his purpose he has ably and honestlj' executed. The claims of " Nature *' to take the place of God, our author eloquently and powerfully exposes. The tendency of youthful passions indulged in, to debase and brutalize the mind, and of scientific enquiries prosecuted in a spirit of self-conceit, to darken the perceptions of rightand wrong, and to harden man against religious truth, is urged with an energy, and occasionally with a captivating sweetness of phraseology, by which, almost insensibly, we are carried, or rather hurried along. And objections to revealed religion, founded on its difficulties, are retorted on the objector by allusions to the insurmountable difficulties presented by nature and facts themselves, with overwhelming conclusiveness. The logi- cal sequence of the topics treated of is most admirable. While the rich, but subdued imagination, in which the language and sentiments are steeped, and the sweet aroma of genuine poetic feeling which they diffuse all around, are to the mind of every competently instructed reader most refreshing. Could we get over our fundamental objection to any work on the subject of what are denominated "the evidences of Christianity," being employed as a means of making men Christians, the poem now before us would be still more gratifying and satisfactory to us, than it is. Convinced, however, are we — and to our con- viction we have more than once given public expression*— that arguments similar to those employed by our author, and prosecuted as by him they have been, although not without their use, can only at the utmost have a negative influence on the human mind.f They may repel and refute objections to revelation ; they may tend, even, to expose the hollowness and worthlessness of unbelief; but divine light they never can, of themselves, introduce into the heart and con- science. To do this positively — to make the light of the divine glory, in the face of Christ, to shine into the understanding — -is God's sole and inalienable prerogative, which he is pleased to exercise, through the teachings, not of human reason, but of liis own most blessed Word and Spirit. Nevertheless, if infidelit}' is to be refuted, (to do so being the only object aimed at,) and if powerful appeals to human reason, and human feelings, have any weight, and any influence in conducing to such an issue, then, a work written with such ability as is dis- played in the poem of Mr. Cock, cannot be too highly praised, and too highly commended. Having said thus much regarding our author, and in praise of his work — and much more, had time and space permitted, might have been said— it only remains for us to wind up this brief and hasty notice, by a few quotations. These may be taken almost at random. The poem thus begins: — Time was when Prudence stood inspired with zeal. And even Logic learnt the power to feel — When youthful Ardour poured the glowing line, A free libation to the Sacred Nine : * As in the first volume of "The Aasurance of Faith, or Calvinism identified with Univer- salism," 1833, and the preface to Barclay's " Without Faith without God," edition 1836. t Unless God, in his infinite sovereignty, and according to his eternal purpose, be pleased himself to interpose — superseding human reasonings by divine illumination. This, however, it is to be remembered, in, in most instances, not the rule, but the exception. Matt. vii. 13j 14. THE INFIDEL. 61 Then rose the visions beautiful in song ! Then dwelt the living rapture on the tongue ! Then on the ear broke the soft chaunt of Fame, And laboured all the bieast to gain a name ! Luxuriant moments to the early Muse ! Oh ! that for aye she would these iires infuse ! How fresh remembrance then of pictures past, "Which may o'er future years rich influence cast. Full many a vernal morn has op'd since then, And vernal eve has closed each bud again : &c. At the tliird page, we meet with the following : — Faint Autumn sat one eve, in bright array, Upon the silken lap of fading day The golden sward drew forth each loveliest Muse, That dipt her pinions in ten thousand hues. Alfred o'er many a mount had tireless trod, And drunk from many a vale the wines of God ; Kissed from fair Flora's lip the luscious dew, As down the deep Sol's burning chariot flew. Wrapt in its sweetness, bent each pensive flower, In modest homage to the Ruling Power : The blackbird's song had fled the gloomy grove, And left it to the whisperings of love : The broods of heaven were slumbering : the lamb Had found the fleecy shelter of the dam : * ♦ * « • Then stealing up the eastern skies, the car Of cool Diana spread her glory far ; Kindly, lay scattered o'er the lake below. Her evening oft'ring, like pure flakes of snow. Heaven's holy breathings melted down the soul, And flung a luscious concord o'er the whole. Again : Seest thou Lemander ! distant lightnings play. The flashing mimics of the Moon's bright ray ? How arrogant yon momentary gleam, To Luna's gentler, all pervading stream ! So, whilst o'er Nature's unsurveyed profound Truth, all effulgent, sheds her light around, Quick dart athwart the Sceptic's partial eye, Th'electric currents of a darker sky ; A fancy he believes, but doubts the Sun ; Proves three are three, but never three titnes, one ; To strike unsav'ry truth will canvass hell, Yea ! prove himself to be impossible. With atheistic taper to his eyes, The fatal glare extinguishes the skies. Caught by the sparkle of some dazzling things. He passes by the source whence Beauty springs. Reasons till Reason insult oft obtains. And quits the inglorious rule of impious brains. Thou Hercules ! unbind thy mental thongs. And give the winds thy voluntary wrongs ! Thou tall Colossus ! stoop from climes of air ; For Reason's viands are substantial fare ! Take now thy tube ! — what particles of light, A million in each moment — cross the sight ! Go, analyze the ambient atmosphere ! — What living myriads in each inch appear ! These functions have appropriate — these live Upon the pensions which their instincts give ; Yea ! bask in joys luxuriantly bright, Which Nature generates by heat and light. Whose hand, thus open, yields them every good — Existence, life, enjoyment, rest, and food ? * * • « « What is thy boast, then ? Say, where hast thou been ? What found or done, or heard, or felt, or seen ? 62 REVIKW8. This little range of sky is to the whole Less than the first idea to tlie soul. A ray upon the heavens — a tiny gem, Scarce glittering on the Eternal's diadem. With all this vast of Being spread to thee, "What MIGHT unseen sustains immensity ? pp. 18 — 20. Let one more quotation suffice : — Light breaks from Heaven upon the rising morn, Empyrean hues the mountain tops adorn ; The modest Moon puts on her veil, to see Her Lord, bright riding forth in majesty. The star is in the east : the babe appears — The dawning prelude of refulgent years : The shepherds lift their voice ; the valleys ring With Hallelujahs.— See Earth's rightful King ! The prince of darkness from his Cavern screams. For Knowledge wields her mightiest boast — her beams : The holy Sabbath of a thousand years, The great Millennium, appears — appears ! Then shall Messiah reign o'er all his foes, In the soft splendour of supreme repose ; The Jew beneath his cross, in tears shall bow ; The Greek bring forth his offering and his vow ; The captive leap from chains of wrong and gore : The Soldier spill his brother's blood no more ; Devotion with her sister — Happiness, Shall every nation, every bosom, bless ; Want shall at Bounty's smile shrink far away. And doubt quick vanish 'neath the gaze of day.* — pp. 96, 97. D. T. Remarks on the study of languages, tvith hints on comparative translation and philological construing. Reprinted, with additions, from " the classical Museum.'' — By John Price, M.A, formerly Scholar of St. John's Cambridge, a Master of Shrewsbury School, and of the Bristol College. — London ; Whittaker & Co. and Taylor & Walton. 1850. Our personal respect and affection for Mr. Price, author of the clever brochure bearing the above title, would of themselves have enforced a notice of any thing emanating from his pen. Able, learned, industrious, persevering, conscientious — a lover of the Lord Jesus Christ, and a patient sufferer for his sake— Mr. Price has many claims on the sympathies of those who, in the Son of God crucified and glorified, find all their salvation and all their desire. His claims on ours, we feel and recognize. Me may not, to be sure, see and worship with us. Towards the doctrine of Universal Salvation, as never having had his attention particularly fastened on it, lie may look with a somewhat dubious eye. But let him be a member of the " Plymoutii Brethren," or of whatever sect he please, upon his conscience the truth of God appears to have taken hold, and in his heart the spirit of heavenly love appears to be operating. Hence we love him, and cannot help loving him, for the truth's sake that divelleth in him, and shall he with him for ever. 2 John, 2. Mr. Price, however, viewed as a literary man, requires not the aid of our sympathy. His high and acknowledged scliolarship places him in a position to command, not imjilcn-e, the notice of critics. And in the pamphlet now before us, we have a work, in which varied talents, and varied learning, com- bined with great usefulness, are too conspicuous, to justify any, who take an interest in the culture and expansion of the youthful mind, to overlook it. * Mr. Cock, wlio is a native of Mevagissy, Cornwall, has for many years had his residence in Btonehouse, one of tlie suburbs of Plymoutii. Few have been our opportunities of enjoying per- sonal converse with this poet and Christian: few, however, as they have been, they have left upon ovir mind the impression of his bcinK a keen, observinK, intelligent and nnaKinative— a larfe'c-mindcd and warm-hearted man. Well may the Christian Universalists of Plymouth, Stonehousc, and Devonport, be proud to have such a man residing among them. THE ONE FAITH OF THE GOSPEL. 63 The grand object of our author is to bring under public notice the system of comparative translation of the Greek and Latin classics which was so happily begun and prosecuted at Shrewsbury School, by the late celebrated Dr. Butler, long the head master of that Seminary, and for a short time Bishop of Litch- field and Coventry. Rather, that system, as modified and improved by Mr. Price himself, and adapted by him to instruction in the modern, no less than the antient tongues. Its value is attested by the unprecedented success of Dr. Butler's pupils, in carrying off honours at Oxford and Cambridge ; as well as by the very great success of Mr. Price himself. The system of comparative translation has for its aim, not to cram, but to inspire thought. Translation is, with our author, made the medium of stimulat- ing and exercising the logical, critical, and inventive faculties. No one, it strikes us, can be brought thoroughly under the influence of this system — un- less, indeed, he be an incorrigible dunce — without having imparted to him the elements of sound scholarship, and without having his intellect at once en- lightened and enlarged. We should add, strengthened also. Simple, but not on that account the less effective, is the plan pursued. — Paper is prepared. A good, plain, idiomatic translation into English, (or the vernacular or foreign tongue, as the case may be,) of some passage in a dead or living language, is required. Sufficient space is left between the lines. Above each line, in blue ink is written, say in English, what is literally ex- pressed in the foreign tongue, wherever variations between the two languages occur. To indicate the extent of variation, underlining of the English trans- lation is had recourse to. Loops made above, point to words existing in the original, which, from difference of idiom, difference of arrangement of words or other causes, are in the rendering omitted. Every sort of opportunity and encouragement is given to the pupil, to be as minute in his observations and criticisms, on diversities of thought and idiomatic pecuharities, as possible. — Red ink is employed in correcting the exercises by the master. To him, no less than to the pupil, the following out of such a system must be at once in- structive and suggestive. Briefly and faintly have we sketched the outline of Mr. Price's plan. His ■work itself must be read, and pondered on, in order to its being perfectly understood and appreciated. Impatient and superficial readers will perhaps content themselves with looking at the "Hints,' pp, 9 and 10, and the exam- ples of the working of the system which are given in the Appendix. To parents who purpose imparting to their children a classical and liberal education — to gentlemen and ladies engaged in teaching — and to senior pupils, we say unhesitatingly, get, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest, the contents of this short, but masterly and valuable treatise. D. T. The One Faith of the Gospel. By Robert G. Hunt. 3rd Edition, 1849. The author of this little tract evidently loves the Lord Jesus Christ wishes to see the gospel proclaimed in its purity and simplicity by religious teachers and deems it incumbent on him to point out some of the but too common mis- apprehensions and misrepresentations by which divine truth is corrupted. One leading idea, the unconditionality of life everlasting, pervades his work. We could have wished that, in other productions of his, he had not exhi- bited such bitterness of spirit, as he has done, against what he does not under- stand, namely, the scriptural doctrine of God's universal love; and that he had been preserved from taking up certain crotchets, respecting the human nature of our blessed Lord. Ignorant of what is implied in the Son of God being spiritual Adam as well as spiritual Abraham, his views of the deliverance wrought out by him as The Saviour of the world, 1 John iv. 14, although in many respects exceedingly correct, are yet necessarily one-sided and partial. Ignorant of what is implied in our Lord having been conceived and born of a 64 REVIEWS. woman — in his having become hone of our hone, and Jlesh of our Jlesh — and overlooking the fact, that, while as having had God for his Fatlier, the seed, principle, or personality of his existence was divine, yet, as having had woman for his mother, his form, fashion, or nature was human (Phil. ii. 5 — 11, with Rom. viii. 3), he has fallen into some strange vagaries, and adopted some strange modes of expression. Because a body was prepared for our Lord, he has not observed, that it was prepared in the womb of a human female ; and because our Lord's humanity was only on the side of his mother, he has jumped to the conclusion, that, therefore, he had human nature iii no respect whatever. We acquit him most cheerfully of wishing to promote the sentiments of the Docetae.* His wish is, we have every reason to believe, to maintain the purity from sin of our blessed Redeemer. This is laudable. But every scriptural truth should be maintained in a scriptural way. Jesus' purity was ensured, by his seed, or principle of existence, being divine. He was the Lord from Heaven. (1 Cor. xv. 47.) His connection with us, — the ground of all our hope towards God — was ensured, by the nature which he took hold of, and, in taking hold of, purified, being human. God, in him, as his only begotten Son, brought the clean thing, out of the unclean. Notwithstanding however, Mr. Hunt's serious blunders, and some unadvised and bitter expressions which, in support of what he deems to be right, he has in other productions of his made use of, we admire him for his honesty of pur- pose, and love him for the truth's sake, in so far as that truth dwells in him. We especially like the tract now before us, on account of the truly scriptural principle which it is his object to commend to notice, and of the manly, straight- forward, and uncompromising manner, in wliich he contends for it. All con- ditions of salvation he sees clearly to have been fulfilled and exhausted by the Son of God himself. Salvation, in consequence, he sees with equal clearness, comes unconditionally, that is, freely or as a mere gift, to its guilty and dying recipients. In Christ's divine righteousness, — and in it only, but certainly, — does every believer of the gospel know himself to stand accepted before God. To the finished work of the blessed and adorable Creator, no act of the creature, be it great or small, be it more refined, or less refined, be it bodily or mental, be it faith viewed as an act of ours, or supposed good works, can, he knows well, by any possibility be added. While false gospels proclaim some condition or conditions as yet remaining to be fulfilled by the sinner, before he can pai'- ticipate in the benefits flowing from Christ's death and resurrection, the true gospel is simply the manifestation to us, by God himself, and on his own in- fallible testimony alone, that in Christ, as a matter of fact without any act of ours whatever, we have salvation with eternal glory. The glad tidings are, when the ear to hear is vouchsafed to us, that in Christ's precious blood our sins have been washed away ; and that in liim we are, even now, partakers of life everlasting. Glad tidings, indeed — glad tidings of great joy — to us the guilty children of men. While false faiths respect a false gospel, in which man's hopes of divine favour are made to rest on his becoming either in whole, or in part, his own Saviour — the " one faith of the gospel,'' contended for by Mr. Hunt, and by all to whom simple divine truth is dear, is faith in the divine and therefore infallible testimony concerning God's Son, dying and rising again, as revealing him who, independently of all acts and merits of ours, is our sole, present, certain and everlasting Saviour. Thus as not in a spirit of fault finding, but approvingly, we began this notice, it must be obvious to Mr. Hunt that, in spite of what we deem grievous errors of his, we are determined, God enabling us, to assist and co-operate with him in the maintenance of what we consider to lie at the very bottom of real and vital godliness. D. T. * May we respectfully recommend to Mr. Hunt's serious and prayerful consideration 1 John iv. 2, 3? Theflesli, observe. Not flesh of beasts,oi ot some being who is not connected with Adam's ^i,cf,—yi,:ih iif ti((iv, un.2iu\. 1768, and finished her course at Liverpool, Dec. 6th, 1847, his feelings are still too keenly sensitive, to permit the writer to say a word more. The city of Glasgow, rapidly advancing in population and wealth, remained without any efficient and satisfactory system of Police, till the year 1800. The old " Watch and Ward" practice, a'< long felt to be extremely burdensome, had a short time previously been discontinued ; but the plan which at first was adopted turned out to be a complete failure, having become an object of dislike, as well as a laughing-stock, to the inhabitants. Something required to be done, to meet the exigencies of the case. But as the Corporation of Glasgow, like other Scotch town Councils at that period, was a self-elected body, a strong disincli- nation was felt to entrust its members with the power of imposing assessments on tlieir fellow citizens, even for objects admitted by all to be desirable and expedient. This operated long as a bar in the way of needful improvement. At last, a compromise was effected. With common consent, an act of Parlia- ment was passed in 1800, by which Glasgow was divided into 24 wards, or districts for police purposes ; and to each of these divisions was assigned an un- salaried commissioner, or representative, himself |)aying at least £30 of rent annually, and elected by householders whose rent was £10 ayear, and \ip wards. These twenty-four Commissioners of Police, together with the Lord Provost, for the time being, and seven other members of the Town Council, were con- stituted a board, or court, for assessing the inhabitants, for lighting the streets, for the appointment of constables and watchmen, for extinguishing fires and for other objects recommended by considerations of public safety, comfort, and utility. Mr. Thom was chosen Commissioner for the 17th. Ward, in 1802. * About the time referred to in the text, Mr. Thom, influenced particularly by the impaired state ot his health, cherished intentions of going out to Jamaica, and had actually made prepa- rations for the vovage, when business proposals and arrangements interposed to prevent the ful- filment of his design. I have heard him say that, out of 21 young men, several of whom were known to him, who then went to the island, (Jamaica,) and whom he was to have accompanied, after the lapse of two years, only one, or at the utmost two were in existence. + Of these, only James Montgomery, of Shenield,—poeiarum nostrurum hand minimus certe— still survives. I Mr. Thom, while much attached to his native country, was also extremely fond of the En- glish nation and character. His own affectionate and generous dispositions, always on the look- out for something congenial, had prepared him to sympathize with Englishmen. He liked their frankness, their straightforward mode of transacting business, and the apparent fervour and earnestness of their devotion. Many interesting anecdotes, illustrative of this latter quality, he has given me. While on his journies, he made a point to hear, not only popular clergymen of the Established Church, but theleading Methodist, Independent, and Baptist preachers of the day. Samuel Pearce, of Birmingham, he took a lively interest in, and his untimely fate, he deeply de- plored. His associations were chiefly with the superior, and more religious class of his English customers. Between him and them, a strong mutual liking subsisted. § David— William, who died amedical student, March, 1813— Jane Campbell, whe fell a victim to consumption, May 23, 1S22— John, a resident in the Island of Jamaica, for upwards of 33 years, and still alive— Margaret Corss, married to Mr. George Charles— Christina Stewart, who died in infancy, 1805— James, whose brief but interesting career, terminated at Kingston, Ja- maica, May 21, 182-4— Robert, the eminent Chinese scholar who, after havmg rendered very considerable services to his country during our recent hostilities with the "Celestial Empire,' was appointed Consul at Ningpo, March, 1844, and died there Sept. 14, 1846— and Janet Falconer, (eheu ! quam deploranda, deplorataque,) who expired at Rothesay, Isle of Bute, Sept. 15, 1828. VOL. II. M 74 JOHN Tjrasr. To him it was most gratifying to find himself associateJ, at the police boart?, ■with several of the wisest, and most esteemed of his fellow citizens.* It was, huleed, then a high honour, to hold the situation which he did. My fatliei-'s activity, general intelligence, prudence, business habits, and integrity, soon raised him to a leading position at the board. He was fur many years. Con- vener (u* Chairman of one of its most important and influential Committees. 'I'he entire confidence of the electoi's of Ins ward, as well as of the public in general, he possessed. This was evinced, by his having been several times re-elected as Commissioner. And to the close of his life, he might have con- tinued to fill this office, had not increasing bad health necessitated a chan2;e of residence, and thereby disqualified him. He retired amidst the deep regret of his constituents. Standing higli as a man of integrity and honourable feeling, as well as a man of sense, several societies were glad to avail themselves of his services, as one as tlieir office-bearers ; and many were the private trusts, from abroad, as well as at home, devolved, I might almost aay, pressed on him.f How well — how conscientiouslv and humanely — he discharged these, survivors can tell. Towards the end of P'ebruary, 1812, in the midst of Mr. Thorn's active and useful career, disease attacked him imexpectedly, and while apparently in the enjoyment of the best health. Strangulated hernia, which rendered necessary the performance of an operation, and which was followed by a paralytic seizure, prostrated his powers, and impaired his usefulness. He languished in a state of distres.-iing debility, sinking more and more, until the morning of Monday, the 17th. day of October, 1814, when apoplexy suddenly, but gently, stept in to grant him a release from his sufferings. At the period of his decease, he liad not quite completed his fifty-first year. His removal was mucii and generally lamented. With regret, but "in the sure and certain hope of a joyful I'esurrection,' his relations, and a large number of attached fellow citizens, deposited his remains in the cryjit of the Cathedral of Glasgow,;!; in a burial- place purchased by him from the heritors of the Barony Parish — situated immediately to the north of the recumbent statue of St. Kentigern, and almost close to the grave of the celebrated and ill-fated, Edward Irving. Some general remarks, concerning the character of my father, seem appro- priately to come in here. Poliiically considered, Mr. Thorn was, what in days that are long bygone was denominated a democrat. And owing to the firmness and decision with which he avowed his sentiments, and the upright consistency with which he acted on them, he at first laboured under the suspicions, and was for a time exposed to a'l the persecutions, petty and otherwise, which persons holding liberal opinions were, sixty years ago, obliged to make up their minds to. He was one of those, who, in 1792, had the courage to attend the meeting of Glasgow Refonners, presided over by Mr. Lambton, to which allusion was made by the late Earl of Durham, son of that gentleman, at the banquet given to him, by his friends and admirers, in 18.34. — III, however, should we dis- charge our duty to our parent, and unjustly should we deal with his memory, if we left it to be sup])03ed, that he was distinguished by any of the qualities of the demagogue — tliat decision in jxilitics was united in him to a violent and turbulent temper, or rendered him rash and precipitate in his procedure. Well did his contemporaries know (he contrary. Nothing in Cicero and Sallust's descriptions of a Catalinc could apply to him. VVith a firmness of * Amonfj tlicse may he mentioned, tliat honest man and sterling patriot, Alexander Oswald. Esq., of Shieldhall, father of James Oswald, Esq , of Auchiueruive, long M. P. for tlie City of (ilasKow.— Mr. Oswald was a near relation of tl>e celebrated author of the Essay on " Common t Besides my own personal recollections on tlie subject, I am borne out by the number of powerB of attofTioy, and other documents connected with the affairs of friends whicli, subse- quently to my father's deatli, I found anions his papers. X This was for a long term of years, the Church of llie liarony Parish of Glasgow ; and, as the 'Laigli Barony Kirk," is most powerfully and graphically described l)y Sir Walter Scott, in his ascinatinj,' novel of " Rob Hoy." JOHN THOM. 75 character wliicli no opposition and no sufferings could slial^e, — with undaunted courage, and witli an uprightness wliich never pcmiitted him to liave recourse to tortuous and time-serving expedients, — he combined a gentleness of spirit, and a moderation of conduct, wliich at any time, and especially at sucii a time are rare, consequently remaikable, and above all decidedly praiseworthy. Every thing at the rera of which we are speaking, 1792, j 3, was in extremes. Mutual exasperation of political parties was one of its most painful character- istics. Aristocrats positively hated democrats ; and by democrats was this feeling of hatred retorted with interest. Scarcely did any man seem capable of making allowances for the education, prejudices, and circumstances of his neighbour. The French Jlevolution, that political and social volcano, had stirred up from the bottom, and brought to the surface, the very worst passions — the diabolical instincts of human nature. A desire to have recourse to violence, in putting down their political opponents, was common to both parties. Johti Thorn's conduct was all the while calm, mild, and conciliatory.* With men of violence he refused lo cast in his lot. The Meeting of the British Convention at Edinburgh, in 1793, 4, he declined having anything to do with; and its wild and chimerical, because impracticable, (although, perhaps, honestly meant) schemes, he utterly discountenanced and repudiated. Nothing but cfilni, earnest, forcible remonstrances with the Government of the day, met his ideas of what was then incumbent on reformers. The public, he contended, should be enlightened — honestly zealously, and perseveringly, but prudently enlightened — as to the defects in the constitution of the country, made then fauf too apparent in its practical workings — as to the remedies required for these — and as to the proper means of applying tliem. But nothing more. Every thing, in his opinion, should be left to time, and to the progress of the human mind. With an educated people, with a free press, with the right of petition and remonstrance, and with our valuable institutions defective although in many respects they might be, he did not despair of ultimate success. The greatest integrity, however, could not at first shield Mr. Thom from the reproaches of his own party. His moderation, they could neither understand, nor appreciate. It was enough with many democrats — some of them truly honest men — to condemn my father, that although content to suffer for the avowal of his opinions, he was not prepared to employ violence in their support. Hence, what in him sprang from moderation — from Christian principle — and from a calmer and more profound view of human nature, and the exigen- cies of human society, than was at that period taken by most of his contem- poraries, was by many, professing sentiments similar to his own, set down to the score of cowardice. Probably, some who did not know hjm, might even suspect him of time-serving. I"o all such charges, and to every surmise of his h-iving been actuated by imworthy motives, a life of firm and nndeviating, altliough moderate assertion of liberal sentiments— an o])eii avowal from which, although at the expense of much personal feeling, and the incurring of con- siderable losses, he never shrank — and a confidence, like that of his friend, Thomas Muir,f and expressed with equal decision, that " the good cause of * The following little anecdote, once related to me by him, may serve to illustrate and confirm this. — " Owinji to the exasperated state of parties, my friends and myself had been compelled to retire from the Exchange Reading Room, on account of our political sentiments." (1793.) "Wc immediately summoned, and lield a meeting, for the purpose of getting up another institation of a kindred nature. At that meeting it was proposed, as one of our fundamental laws, that 'no aristocrat should be eligible as a member, or become entitled to any of the privileges and advan- tages of our association.' To this proposal, I at once, and unhesitatingly demurred. I said, that 'it struck me as not only savouring of revenge, but as inconsistent with our own professed jirinciples. We had been made the victims of harsh and illiberal treatment. Let us not stultify ourselves, and justify what our political adversaries had done to us, by pursuing a similar course towards them.' — My opposition was in vain. The motion was carried against nie. Thencefor- ward, I sawthat I had lost the confidence of the leaders of the party; and they, certainly, did not possess mine. However, as I ajjproved of their objects generally, and as I believed them, iiv spite of their hot-headedness and violence, to be worthy and honest men, I did not withdraw; but continued for many years to frecjuent the room, and pay my annual subscription." t None could admire Mr. Muir's integrity, or respect the motives of his conduct, more highly than did my father. Nay. I have heard him admit, that in the estimate which he bad formed of 76 JOHN TiioM, reform would ultimately prevail" — afFordod tlie best reply, Mr. Thotn was not a man of violence, but lie had emphatically tlie spirit of a martyr. He could, wlien necessary, openly and unhesitatingly avow what he thought; and he could patiently take the consequences.* His character, as a })olitician, 1 can from recollections of my own illustrate. VVlien telling him some of the day- dreams which a perusal of the classics, and of such books as the late Sir James Macintosh's J'indicicB Gallicce, had inspired me with, he lias said to me : — " Violence in politics is most distasteful to me. Even anxious as I am, to see the cause of liberty and good governinent prevail, I would not do, I would not sanction others in doing, the sliglitest injury to one of my fellow men, in order to promote it. Leave matters to time, David. If violence be resorted to, with a view to advance even the cause of truth — the cause of what is right and de- sirable — not more inconsistent is such procedure with Christianity, than is it calculated to defeat its own professed object. All premature reforms are apt to be short-lived. Let public Ojiinion precede legislative enactments, and tlie law thus merely give form and authority to what is already the matured con- viction of the })eople, and we get on. Acting otherwise, rash innovations are but too likely to be followed by retrogression ; nay, may lead even to the re- suscitation of despotic powers which, as having long lain in abeyance, might appear to have altogether passed away.'' — How much do I owe to my dear father's advice and suggestions in such matters ! — Such sentiments as those which 1 have (pioted, may not now be inicommon ; but looking back fifty or sixty years, by how very few of the parties who were then engaged in the great political struggle, were ihey even conceived of, muth less held and maintained. — My father loved our British institutions, with all their defects. Their ame- lioration, not their destruction, was one of the wishes nearest and dearest to his heart. The torn-foolery of French Republican names and practices, his strong, slirewd, common sense, always kept him aloof from. War, he abhorred; and, therefore, although j)atriotically desirous to see the French driven back from our shores, — not insensible to the glory which our naval victories, and the triinnphs of our arms by land, had been the means of achieving ; — and grate- ful to butli services, for these exertions of theirs by which, cnder God, our pri- vihges civil and religious had been secured to us, he never coidd be prevailed on to take up arms. He conceived that the profession of a soldier, however Mr. Muir's aljilities, wliile ;it College, he believed himself to have been mistaken. He was satis- fied that he had iii)(len::ted them. After coming to the bar, that Henllcnian, in Dr. M'Gill, of Ayr's trial, (see the Doctor's able and learned, but not less heavy than Socinian work, on the Sinshi]) of Jesus Christ, 1780, and liurns' Poems,) before the Synod of (ilasgow and Ayr, and in the case of two soldiers brought to the l)ar of the Justiciary Court at Glasgow, liad displayed an elo(|uenre, and general forensic talents, for the possession of which, no one previously had given him the .slightest credit. Kut, notwithstanding, Mr. Muir, in my fatlier's opinion, was too much of an enthusiast. He was apt to overlook diliicultiesand obstacles which cooler judgments per- ceived ; and to rush to conclusioiiH which, could they have been realized, would have eniian- pcred the peace of Society. My father, with many others, considering that Mr. Muir had, by several rash and iiijudicioiifi steps, iiol only produced results disastrous to himself, but detri- mental to the interests which he was sincerely desirous to promote, deprecated the popular cause being entrusted lo his leadersliip. — Nonecouid more decidedly and feelingly condemn, the luirsli and brutal usage which, aftei' liis trial and conviction for sedition, (1793,) that gentleman met with, than did my hoiiouu'd parent. * Mr. 'J'hciii was the near relative of one wlio has acquired the rank and character of a mar- tyr, in the i stiiiiation of many of the Hcottisli peoi)le. I allude to Robert Thom, a good man who was shot at Poimadie, near (Ilasgow, May 11th, lOK.'i, for adhering to the -'Cause of Covenanted Reformation," and refusing to i]ray fcjr King James VII; and whose remains, with those of Thomas Cook, and John I'rie, barbarously murdered on the same occasion, were deposited under " the martyrs' stone" in Cathcarl Church Yard. The details of the cabc, w liicli are briefly adverted to in "The Cloud of Witnesses," will be found set down at full length, in Wodrow's "History of the Suffering.- of the Church of Scotland," during the persecuting reigns of Charles 11. and J;:mes II., Vol. IV. jij). 2.')0, 251, of Burns' edition, Glasgow, 1S,'!8 See also p. 17, of the same volui.ie. Altbou'h admiring his relation's honesty, respecting the firmness and conscientiousness with which he maintained his principles, and condemning the atrocities of the Stuart adminis- tration, my father with equal decision, condemned that princijile of armed resistance to "the ])owcrs that be," and disposition to take the sword for the iiromotion of what was deemed to be truth, of which the I!ol)crt Thom of that period, in comnMHi willi hi:- party, was a sii])porter — Ky the liy, one of my molher's ancestors, Mr. William r'alconcr, ot Hamilton, altliougli not raised to the dignity of a nuir/i/r. ranks among the cutifcssors of the period in question. Wodiow, Burn's I'diliou, vol. lit. iJ.217,iind vol. iv. p. lyo. JOHN TIIOM. 77 useful and lionourablo, and however necessary, sccnlaily conslcleied, in the present state of Society, was inconsistent with the genius of Cliristianity. Matt, xxvi. 51 — 53, John xviii. 36.* — The rights, privileges and claims of otiiers, whatever might be their opposition to himself in civil or religious matters, John Thoin always had a most tender and sacred regard for. In all social changes — even in the removal of proved and acknowledged abuses — he insisted that justice should be done to every one — that vested rights should be respect- ed — and tliat public improvements shovdd be postponed, rather than carried by acts wliich might have even t!ie semblance of violence and oppression. "No man, be he great or small — be he aristocrat or democrat — should, even for pur- poses of manifest utility, be deprived of his property, without adequate com- pensation.'' C. J. Fox's well-known idea, as to the identity of the principles of public and private morals, was his. My father's mode of thinkingas to topics of great and stirring interest may be best exemplified, by quoting his language in re- ference to slavery and the slave trade: "Do justice to the slave, certainly. Let the accursed traffic in human Hesh and bones, be at once abolished; and let slavery — -man's claim to hold in perpetual bondage, and to treat as if he were a portion of liis goods and chattels, his fellow man — with all its attendant abominations, as unjust, as nefarious, as brutalizing, as absolutely inconsistent with Clu'istiaiiity, be banislied completely and for ever from ihe face of the earth. But see that, in doing justice to the slave, you do justice also to the slave owner. Make not men, Avhom you have encouraged, nay urged to invest their capital in this loathesome species of property, and to whom you have guaranteed its possession, the sport of yoiu* caprice, and the victims of your fit of lardy national repentance. Put down the slave trade. Liberate the slave. But in doing so, take for the model of your procedure, the conduct of King David, in the matter of the threshing floor, cattle, and implements, of Araunah, the Jebusite.''f To us now, there is no novelty in such language and such opinions. Our parliamentary compensation of £20,000,000 sterling to the British planter, when emancipation was conceded to ihe slave, — an act which constitutes not the least of England's glories — stamps my honoured relation's views as having been, in 183G, those of the nation to which he belonged. But be it remem- bered, that the sentiments ju.t quoted, were cherished by him as far back as 1790. At that period, he had but few, comparatively speaking, who were like- minded and sympathized with him. Scarcely was anything then to be heard but, on the one hand, a demand for the immediate and unconditional abolition of the slave trade, let the consequences be what tiiey might; and, on the other, the dogged and sullen utterance of a determination uncompromisingly to main- tain it, by parties who deemed its perpetuation essential, not merely to the well-being, but to the very existence of our West-Indian Colonies. Interesting, surely, is it to think, that at this long by-past period of extremes, when men were positively deaf to the strongest itrguments proceeding from the side that * There were several points in regard to which my father, to a certain extent, agreed with the Quakers. Particularly, lie looked on war, andon warlike operations as, under all circumstances, unchristian. Not, however, that he denied the use or necessity of military power. Christian principles, he always contended, must not he confounded with those of the present world. John xviii. 36. "In the case of the resistance of tlie American Colonies, now the United States, to Great Britain, I distinguish between the justice of their cause, and the means by which they carried it; and between what human and patriotic principles, on the one hand, and Christian principles, on the other, dictated. In taking up arms, and achieving their independence by main force, tliey acted rightly as human beings ; but on the maxims enunciated by the Son of God, Matt. V. 38 — tS, and according to the law of love, Rom. xiii. 10, they never can be justified." Thus, in one particular instance, he anticipated that doctrine of the essential antagonism sub- sisting between human and divine principles, to which, when observed by myself,! have ven- tured to give the name of •' Divine Inversion." Would my father, holding the sentiments which he did, if he had lived, have become a member of a " Peace Society ?" I am dubious. The suc- cess of such societies, if feasible. I am certain he would have pr.ayed for. But with human nature, constituted as it is, staring him in the face, Titus iii 3, James iv. I, and the impossibility of human nature ever, while it lasts, casting off its essential properties, laid down as an axion of God's word, Jer. xiii 23, Matt. xii. 2.5—29, must he not have regarded the anticipations of human benevolence, in reference to the cessation of "wars and fightings amonL' men," as, at the best, but adrean;? t 2 Sam. xxiv. 18—25. 78 JOHN THOM. was opposed to tlicm, and when enthusiasm or self-interest ruled public opinion, there were a few who could look calmly and impartially at both sides ofa much- vexed question — could reconcile the most intense hatred of slavery, with an equally intense hatred of whatever was at variance with the plainest dictates of common justice, and common honesty — and could thus pave the way for those matured convictions of their countrymen, which weie destined to be embodied in an act of the legislature, at a future day.* — Pursuing sucli a course, holding such sentiments, and influenced by motives at once just, wise and honourable, it will not surprise my readers to be told that, wliile Mr. 'J'hom was the friend and associate of determined but moderate and patriotic reformers, with many gentlemen of opposito political sentiments, he was on terms of the greatest in- timacy. After the first explosion of party feeling — after the first access of the revolutionary fever — ^7as over, even conservatives felt constrained to admire a man, in whom the greatest firmness and resolution were found united to an equal degree of caution ; and whose ardent love of reform had not blinded him to the fundamental excellence of those institutions which he wished to see ameliorated. Such parties might still continue to dislike Mr. Thom's senti- ments, as a whole ; but they could not help observing, that in him they were perfectly compatible with his being a good man, and a good citizen. The num- ber of leading men, on both sides of politics, who lamented his death, and tes- tified their respect by attending his funeral, speaks volumes as to his character. Ill a literay point of view, I experience some difficulty in speaking of my father. Although a great reader, and stored as to his mind with much varied and useful information, the original defects of liis education clung to him to the last. The incessant demands of business too on his time and attention, and the many public duties which he had to discharge, active as he was, sadly interfered with that cultivation of his mind, and that gratification of his literary tastes of which he was so desirous. I learned from him, that between 1787 and 1792, or thereabouts, he was in the habit of contributing scra))s of poetry, (jc'ttx cP '.'sprit,') as well as letters, and short essays to the Glasgow newsj)a])ers. A number of old Glasgow journals, belonging to the period in question, I have liad in my possession; but in consequence of any productions of my father's which they might contain, not having been marked, I long since abandoned all attempts at identifying them. Several maiuiscripts of his, I have. They consist of poems, political diatribes, and essays and letters on the subject of religion. None of them are in such a state exactly, as to justify me in ])ub- lishing them without revision; indeed, without their having been subjected to much correction, and, in some instances, to curtailment. Should the respected * The immediate emancipation of the grown-up negro, inured to slavery, except under very peculiar circumstances, my father regarded as a positive evil. AVith tlie education ofa slave, he was satisfied, came the low and debased feelings and inclinations of aslave, — came, likewise, an almost neces.sary sense of dependence. So much so, that nominally to emancipate such parties was, in his apprehension, a burlesque on liberty, no less than an act of wanton cruelty to tho.se to whom the boon was vouchsafed. The ivy requires support; and how is it to stand, when the sturdy oak on which it formerly leaned, and around which it had entwined itself, is at once and rudely withdrawn? Ardently, therefore, did he desire to see steps taken, as soon as possible, to prepare the slave for freedom. The exertions of the Moravians, and other missionaries, in this respect, he highly prized. Tlieconduct of the legislature of the State of Nev/ York, in rendering free all negroes, and coloured persons, born within their territory, after the passing of their act, leaving it to proprietors of grown-up negroes, if they saw meet, to manumit them, and to all such negroes the power of purchasing their own freedom, he looked on as, all circumstances consi deied, a ])roj)er and judicious measure. Had he lived, it strikes me, that of the principle of aiiprenticeship, as apidicable to many of our colonies, he would have approved, however objec- tionable he may have deemed certain of its provisions. I am sure, that the conduct of the legislature of Antigua, in dispensing with the apprenticeship system altogether, and at once emancipating their coloured population, on the ground of its high moral, intellectual, and reli- gious character, would have met with his untiualiliedapiirobation. It was solely the good of the negro liimself, that, as respects this matter, lie thought of.— IJefore my father's death, the process of preparation of the negro for manumission, by religious training and otherwise, had in several colonies begun ; and after his death, it was cnrried on. Still, after all, it may be suspected, that tliere was, with regard to some of the West Indian Islands, au undue precipitancy in the final step. A little longer delay might, in some instances, have been advisable and advantageous. Kmanci|)atiou was certainly an act of justice to the negro. Tardy it may be. but has he— e.spccially if of mature age before the passing of the act,— been in all respects bcnclittcd by the change?' I fear not. JOHN TiioM. 79 Editor of the " Universalist " consider any tiling from my father's pen, as worthy of insertion, I may at some future period solicit a place for one or two of them in his pages. Their literaiy characteristics may be brietty stated. Imagination, to a certain degree, they all display. Sweetness, pathos, and occasionally a gleam of sublimity, strike me as distinguisliinar liis poetical effu- sions. His prose writinsrs are clear, manly, and judicious. Eloquent, — it may be sometimes a little diffuse: ahva\'s, however, sensible, and to the point. They appear to me to he singularly nervous and spirited. They are not, I admit, very artistic in their structure ; and they want that polish which practice and leisure, (alas ! Mr. 'J'hom had not much of that,) alone can impart. Yet their writer was fiir from being devoid of taste. Traces of it — untutored, to be sure — are immistakably perceptible in all that he ever composed. His orio-inal classic education although limited, and his acquaintance with the elegancies of French diction, aided by native tact, sufficed to preserve him from coarsenesa and vulgarity of language. Mr. Them's personal appearance was most prepossessing. He was scrupu- lously clean and neat, without being finical in his attire. Somewhat short of stature — not quite five feet, six inches in height* — he was full, without beinf corpulent, and was endowed with an almost faultless symmetry of form. His face in early life, and up to the period of his last illness, could not but be con- sidered handsome. The several features were good. There was complete har- mony among them. And the tout-enxemhle was most attractive and impressive. Not that thf re w^as anything feminine about his aspect. It denoted frankness, benevolence, manliness and intelligence. Peculiar modesty was expressed by it. The sweetness of his smile, I shall never forget. Occasionally, his countenance might have been regarded as that of a proud man. Seldom however. And never, except in self defence. The forward and the assuming, he certainly, by his look, could keep at a distance. Affectionate as he was by nature, and unwilling to create uneasiness in the breast of any one, that man must have been but a poor physiognomist, who failed to discover in the mild and benevolent features of John Thorn, indications of decided self-respect— a deep, althouo-h subdued sense of personal dignity. To his features, his character exactly cor- responded. Affections the most powerful were inherent in his nature. His was a benevolence which never could be satisfied, except when he was engaged in doing good. The law of kindness dwelt in his heart, and the language of kind- ness flowed from his lips But his kindness was not confined to feelings and words. It evinced itself in a humane consideration for the condition and wants of others ; and in a tender desire as far as he could to remove, or at least alleviate their sufferings. He was, without any shew, and without the boastful spirit implied in the use of the language, the realization of Terence's Homo sum : hnmani nihil a me aUenmn puto. Generosity in him went hand in hand with benevolence ; although both were under the control, incessantly, of a strict and efficient sense of justice. Disinterestedness of motives, whether his aims were public or private, formed one of his most prominent characteristics. Indeed he was, in his whole conduct, one of the most unselfish men, whom I have ever met with.f He was fiur and candid in his judgments respecting human character and human actions. In this respect he was no Jospph Surface : for he no less abhorred, and guarded against scandal and detraction on his own part, than he was careful to put down every exhibition of it on the part of others.* Need I add, that he was singularly Wee from petty and spitefiil feelings? Although the opposite of servile or cringing, he was preeminently courteous :§ courteous * He, in point of height and make, took after his mother. His father was a tall man, six feet high, I am told; and all bearing his name whom 1 have seen, with scarcely an exception, have been tall likewise. t In this, as well as in many other respects, his son Robert, the late Consul at Ningpo, strik- ingly resembled hmi. X One most remarkable instance of this, I could give; but I suppress it, as it might appear to involve self-commendation, § 1 Peter iii. 8. 80 JOHN TIIOM. to the bcfrgar, no less tlian to his superiors and equals.* Most forgiving was he in his temper. I have never known one who was more disposed and prepared to act almost literally on our Saviour's precept, as to the pardoning of offences, even to sevcuh/ times Kcven. Nor was this the result of apaihj'. So far was he from being insensible to iiisults and injuries, that few men were naturally more alive to them, or felt tliem more keenly. Had not higher principles interfered and imposed a habitual restraint on his angry passions, I question much when I consider the ill usage, and monstrous ingratitude to which he was but too frequently subjected, if even the almost boundless benevolence of liis nature could, in many cases, have sufficed to curb his resentment. f But the heavenly mind of Christ was in him very powerful. Acquainted with self in the light of the glorious gospel, humbled under a sense of his own short- comings and infirmities, and constantly recognising salvation as wholly of grace through the abounding righteousness of Jesus Christ, he could forgive the trespasses of others, for the sake of that Saviour wiio had freely forgiven him. Was not this magnanimity, in the true and Christian sense of the term?J He was a man of truth. The frankness that beamed from his countenance, was the exact index of the openness of his heart. Integrity and jjunctuality he displaved in all his commercial transactions. Small, comparatively, as was his capital, his mercantile credit always stood high ; and never higher than at the time of his decease. Honourable feelings distinguished him. He loathed and kept aloof from all that was mean and tricky. Yon felt almost instinct- ively, when brought into contact with him, that he was a man in whom you could confide. § High moral courage was in him blended with extreme caution. He had a nice and delicate sense of propriety. And, as the necessary con- sequence, he was modest and pure in his whole deportment. Unbecoming and offensive expressions as well as actions, he was peculiarly on his guard against. Self-diffident and self-disparaging he was. Not obtrusively and hypocritically so; but in his inmost heart || Indeed, the sense of self-deprecia- tion he carried perhaps to excess. It was considered by some of his best friends, that through the timidity which was the offspring of his self-distrust, he lost opportunities of bettering his temporal circumstances which men of vastly inferior talents, but of far more sanguine temperament, and endowed with * 1 Peter, ii. 17. + Sometimes, but very rarely, I have remarked a fire in his eye, and a flash of indignation gleaming from his countenance, particularly on the sight or recital of any act of meanness or wickedness, so very marked, as has made me suspect that ani^ry passions of considerable strength lay slumbering in his bosom. Since his death, and since the publication of Sir Walter Scott's erctianting tale, entitled " A Legend of Montrose," I have had my suspicions confirmed, by being made aware that he was descended, and not very remotely either, from the individual to whom that celebrated author has assigned the tictitious appellation of 'Allan MacAulay," and whose violence of temper is, to suit the purposes of the Novelist, grievously exaggerated. See Mr. Stewart, of Ardvorliel's, letter, prefixed to the later editions of the "Legend." Also, liishop Wishenfs "Memoirs," and Mark Napier's "Montrose." Inheriting Major Stewart's blood, it is but too probable, that Mr. Thorn inherited also naturally some of his spirit. Tliis, hovrever, I can say with truth, that ary unseemly ebullition of temper, on the part of my father. I never witnessed. If the lion was there, he was lulled to fleep. {Assonpi ) My honoured parent seemed to me to have all his passions, especially the angry ones, ever under the most rigorous and efficient control. I Have my readers ever seen Soame Jenyns' interesting treatise on the " Internal Evidences of Chriitianity ? " § An English gentleman, not only of superipr talents and occupying considerable rank in society, but standing high likewise on the ground of moral and religious qualities, who had had com/tiercial dealings with my father for a long series of years, remarked when his grave was pointed out by a friend, "There lies one of the most honourably-minded men— perhaps, the most honourably. minded man— whom I ever knew." II Here, again, his son, Hobert, bore a very marked resemblance to him. Scare .'ly ever have I encountered such mode- ty— such self-diffidence— such self-disparaging tendencies, combined with such talents, as in the person of my brother. At a time when his services wvre rewarded with the approbation of his Sovereign and country, and when his progress in Chinese literature was extorting applause from the most distinguished Sinologues of England and the Continent, in his most secret and confidential letters to me, he was continually speaking with generous enthusiasm of patties whom he deemed his suijeriors in ability and attainments, was underrating himself as coiniiari'd with them, atid was ol opinion that he had done next to nothing, in cases where parties competent to judge were satisfied tluit he had done a great deal. JOHN THOM. 81 a larger measure of self-conceit,* would with avidity have seized on. He timorously shrank back from embarking in new undertakings, even where the prospect of success appeared to others the most promising. All this was in his case tlie more remarkable, as his moral courage was undoubted — as his activity of mind was prodigious — and as his spirit of enterprise, when he did exert it, was great and almost uniformly successful. What damped his mer- cantile energies? Could it be conviction of the necessity uf learning a new business through losses, and, perhaps, even entire failure ? Could it be the risk of sullying his fair fame, and bringing reproacli on bis Christian profes- sion, by consequent inability to satisfy his creditors ? Could it be, that he con- ceived himself unwarranted, as a follower of the Lamb, to step out of his own sphere, and outrun God in the course of his adorable providence? These queries, I am imable to satisfy. Suffice it to say, that he preferred continuing to prosecuttj a business wliich he knew, to engaging, with slender resources, in one that he knew not. And that in the estimation of many, thus acting, lie stood in the way of his own interests : it having been next to impossible for him, with his superior abilities, in their opinion, not to have succeeded in becoming a richer man than he actually was. — Tliere was no defect of fiimness, on my father's part. Altogether, especially towards the close of his life, very cautious and deliberate before coming to a conclusion, when his resolution was once taken he adhered to it with a pertinacity, which sometimes might seem to approach to the confines of obstinacy. He had strong domestic affections , but most judicious was he in the display of them. He combined firmness, with the utmost kindness, in his treatment of his children. As to what he was in an intellectual point of view, after the facts already submitted to the reader, a very few words will be enough. He had strong common sense. He observed quickly and accurately ; and was capable of sound, as well ae pro- found reflection. His mind was a large and comprehensive one ; he had great powers of generalization ; and if in respect to dialectic skill and meta- physical acumen, he yielded the palm of superiority to man}^ his faculties of logic and analysis were far from being the least prominent of his intellectual characteristics. He was gifted with much natural eloquence. Mental as well as bodily activity has been more than once, in the previous part of this memoir, referred to, as having been possessed by him in a high degree. Amaz- ing was his penetration into character, and correct his appreciation of the motives of those with whom he had to do. This feature of his mind was part and parcel of that astuteness and perspicacity — that shrewdness — of whic'.i, like his countrymen in general, he possessed no small share; although in him it lay embedded in such a mass of aiTt-ction, and had drawn over it a veil of bene- volent and generous feelings so dense, as almost to screen it from ordinary observation. A gentle but marked hint, on his part, was sometimes required to make individuals aware, that although great allowances were being made for them and no disposition was felt to do them any injury, their characters and designs were perfectly understood. It used to amuse and instruct me, in early life, to see the ease with which my father could lay bare the acutest sophistry, and strip hypocrisy of its disguises; and yet the kindliness of feeling with which, all the while, he did so. It was vice, not the vicious, whom he wanted me to hate. He never forgot, in his severest denunciations against evil, that he himself was a partaker of tiie same nature from which, that whicli he condemned had emanated. He had naturally an almost invincible pro})ensiLy to humour, and a keen relish for displays of it on the part of others ;f but as too frequently leading to the indulgence of malicious feelings,J and as in many * May I not add, with more worldly prudence ? t His son, Robert, possessed this quality, in common with him, to a very high degree. X With great kindliness, but in a manner not to be mistaken, my father once drew my atten- tion to the character of a gentleman, highly estimable in many respects — esteemed by him and esteeming him in return — who was remarkable for his inability to suppress a jest, although its utterance might be at the expense of his best friend, and tend to wound his feelings, if not even to alienate his alfections. Earnestly and impressively did my father urge on me to take warning VOL. II. N 82 JOHN TIIOM. other respects at variance with the spirit and maxims of Christianity,* it was in him nnder strict, constant and effective restraint. I How incessantly watch- ful, indeed, was he to curb and keep within legitimate hounds, his own strong social dispositions! To genius he made no pretensions ; but his possession of a fair share of it was obvious and acknowledged. Originally, as well as power- fully, could he think; but reckoning "an ounce of mother wit, worth a pound of clergy," he never would consent to forego the claims of sound judgment, for any mere theory however plausible and specious, even although that theory might happen to be his own. Consummate prudence he was endowed with ; and well was it for him that this was the case, for it served as a check on a bene- volence which otherwise might have been excessive. This leads me to observe that were I required to select and point out what was the predominant feature of Mr. 'J'hom's mind, I should say unhesitatingly, benevolence. His faults — ■ but who can bear to look at the dark side of a beloved and revered parent's character ? If he had faults, they were such only as are common to men of a warm, energetic, and generous temperament. Vices he had none. None, even, of those foibles, failings, or frailties which on poetic authority, and accorditig to poetic morality, are declared to " lean to virtue's side.'' I can say with truth that never, during the fifty-six years of my own sojourn upon earth, have I met with a human being more consistent — more humbled by the cross — and more lovely, than was he, whose character I am now attempting faintly to delineate. He lived and walked by faith. His purity, circumspec- tion, and blamelessness — in a word, his holiness — of life and conversation, was the theme of universal remark and commendation. Christlanuvi viruin facile dixeris ; bonurn libenler.X (To he conchided in our next.) Ijy his example. — Who is not acquainted with the malicious and spiteful character ascrihed to those imaginary beings called Fairies ; and who has not read, or seen this character embodied in that glorious creation of the great master of the human heart, Shakspeare, his " Midsummer Night's Dream?" Independently, however, of all this, that man must be possessed of but slender knowledge of the world, and can have looked hut superficially at human life, who has failed to observe, that the esprit nioquezir is an esprit malln — that the unrestrained indulgence of fun and frolic is absolutely incompatible with the cultivation and display of benevolent feeling. What mischiefs have sprung from the possession of a talent for humour! Of riducule I should say. * Let noi foolish lalking, nor jesting, which are not convenient, be once named amongst you, as becometh saints. Eph, v. 3, 4. t Occasionally, his propensity to a quiet joke, when it involved nothing improper, was abso- lutely irrepressible. — Dining one day with a party, at the house of a much-respected and wealthy relation of opposite politics to his own, about forty or fifty years ago, when the war phrensy was at its height, a round of lighting men was proposed, by way of a toast. Admirals and Generals of high renown, and unquestionable gallantry, were given in succession. At last it came to my father's turn. Quietly, gravely, and with that dry humour for which the Scotch are so remark- able, he said, " Mendoza." (The name of a then notorious pugilist and prize-fighter.) The joke took, and was highly applauded by the company. X Let it not be supposed, that in speaking with approbation of my father's character, it is my purpose indirectly to praise myself. Alas ! the original and constituent elements of my own na- ture, I know to be in many respects inferior to what his were : and whatever, as a lover of the Lord Jesus, I may have aimed at, and in whatever ways I may appear to fellow believers to have succeeded, I am but too conscious that my life and conversation, viewed as a whole, will never for one moment bear to be brought into comparison with his. Looking at him, and remembering what he was, while I glorify God in him, I am humbled, not exalted. Could any other than myself have been found, qualified from knowledge to write a narrative of my excellent parent, and disposed from affection to do so, right glad should I have been to devolve the task, neces- sarily a delicate one, on him. This, however, could not be. — Differing as we do in other respects, in this my father and I agree. As a sinful and dying creature enlightened by faith, to the same grace of God, abounding through the divine righteousness of Jesus Christ unto eternal life, to which he looked, and in whicl\ he found sweet and abiding consolation, am 1 enabled to look likewise, and in it to experience that peace, and to cherish that joy, which the blood of Christ sprinkled on the conscience, and the power of his resurrection put forth in new-creating efficacy, alone can imparl. 83 A STORY OF GRAGE. CHAPTER III. "Ah' mv friend," said Mr. Weldon " as he entered George's chamber I heard of the accident which had befallen you, and have come to spend five m'nutes with you, in the hope of relieving the monotony ot your solitude. What does the doctor say ?'' „ r^,.,.„^ «;f •' Thanks for your benevolent intention, Mr. Weldon," replied George, it isverv kindofyou; my patience will be put to the test, for the doctor says I must make up my mind to remain here for a few weeks. , , , ,. ^ You wUl n!)t be unsuccessful in the attempt to follow the doctor's direc- tions' I am sure; for I have often remarked that you have a good share of enerffV and enduring resolution." . . , i • t- ;„i i r "Though an inconvenience, Mr. Weldon, how mitigated is my trial! I might have been called to suffer vastly more than I shall l^^ve to endure And how thankful I am that I am under no necessity to resign my ™nd to A^ fame inactivity as that to which my body is subjected by this event! I may reS Td there is a book recently come out which I have made up my mind to peruse. Might I so far presume upon your kindness as to ask you to pro- "'"'' /IhalUeel'a pleasure in assisting you in this, or in any other way ; what !« tlip title and where shall I get it , t r> n "Th tie of the book is 'The Trial of Spirits," the author-James Relly, and it is to he had at Lewis's in Paternoster Row. I have his work on ''':'ro;i:u;'pSrmt'~exclaimed Mr. Weldon, interrupting George " you surely are nofin earnest; you could not read such stuff as he prints-you are aware how strongly ;h J is condemned by those who know more than you or I do about the man.'' j • i ^ w,„coif " " It is because I do not know, that I wish to read and judge for myself Geor-e calmly replied. " A man should not be condemned without a hearmg, Mr. Weldon. Mr. Murray would not have favored a man whose sentiments were ecreaiouslv erroneous.'' , , ^ " I believe in my heart that Murray is a good man ; but the best may en. And as to Rellv-I would prefer leaving him in the hands of those who are much more c'apable of dealing with him than I am : but I will fulfil my promise, and you shall have the book in a day or two, when I will call upon ^^Gefrge'Lnked his friend, and after a cordial fareu-ell Mr. Weldon departed. It was winter. A fall of snow, had been succeeded by a rapid thaw, whicl , again, was followed by a severe frost. On the day preceding that «" jhich the above interview took place George was on his way to his empKveis ^^^^^^ in attempting to save a poor old woman from slipping down he fell himself just as a cart was%mssing, the wheel of which went over his leg and fractured t Geor-e was now much alone, and the time which might otherwise have hung heavily upon his hands, was fully occupied upon a subject in wluch he took a growing interest. The Union, or a treatise concerning the a^mty between Christ and the Church; was a book he had picked up at a stall a few days before he met with the accident which confined him to his bed ; and (the bible excepted) it had recently been almost his sole companion. On his way home Mr. Weldon was met by an individual of some standing in the Whitfield Society; and being concerned lest George Richardson should imbibe the i)rinciples of Relly, and somewhat uneasy on account of the promise he had made respecting the book, he told Mr. Barlow (for that was his name of his visit and his promise, at the same time suggesting that it would be well if he were to put him upon his sick visiting list, and see him accordingly. Mr. 84 A STORY OF GRACE. Barlow, altlioiigli a man of very strong nerve, was shocked at this disclosure, assured Mr. Weldon that he should make it is duty to pay him an early visit, and, after some serious remarks respecting the dangers to which tlie Christian was exposed, left Mr. Weldon at his door. "A rather unpleasant business," said Mr. Weldon to his wife, after having related to her his visit to George Richardson, and his subsequent interview with Mr. Barlow ; "I am not son-y that i met with the worthy gentleman, who seemed much pleased at my confiding so much to him, for I am relieved of the responsibility of it all ; I should he sorry to see George spoiled by vain philosophy, but he could not be in better hands, and Mr. Barlow will be the means, I hope, of saving the bud before the blight of heresy quite destroys it." Nearly a week elapsed before Mr. Barlow found himself at liberty, to call upon George Richardson, whose retirement was only once broken by a call from the poor old woman whom he had saved from falling; for the poor creature — concerned at the ill consequences of his kindness to her — had found him out with a view of ascertainitig hoAV he was. George was expecting Mr. Weldon, and when he heard a knock at his door, instead of the name of his old master being announced, lie was surprised to find that Mr. Barlow had called, a gentleman with whom he had never had two minutes conversation. He told the servant to ask him to M'alk up. " Mr. Ricliardson," said Mr. Barlow, as he entered the room, " I have been anxious to see you about a most important subject, and I have taken the first opportunity of calling upon you for that purpose ; but first tell me how you are, for I was sorry to hear of your accident.'' " I am obliged to you, for calling, Sir,'' said George; "the confinement is tiresome, but I shall soon be about again, with the blessing of God, I trust: but what is this important matter which specially brings you here?" " Since I saw Mr. Weklon, whom I happened to meet the day he called to see you "observed the worthy man, " I have had the most painful apprehen- sion respecting your danger'' — " But, my dear Sir,'' George interrupted, "your alarm is quite needless, for see," and George began to exercise the fractured limb more than he had yet ventured to do, to convince Mr. Barlow that his apprehension was groundless. The visitor returned George's smile with a deep sigh, and resumed — " You mistake me. Sir; the danger I allude to is not that of the body only, but the soul too, tlie never-dying soul ; I tremble for you, — I tremble for myself when I see how many who promised fair, have forsaken the old paths. I under- stand you read Kelly's books ; and I deem it my bounden duty to put the un- wary on their guard, lest they should be overcome by the enemy : depend upon it there is more of the enemy than the friend in Relly's doctrine." This came rather abruptly upon George, and for a moment he felt perplexed as to the course he should pursue. He hesitated, and looked confused. The momentary pause was broken by Mr. Barlow, who more earnestly warned the invalid again:->t false doctrine, and concluded by asking him whether he knew anything at all favorable of Relly. " 1 know how seductive a thing is error. Sir,'' said George, who had now fairly recovered himself, "hut of Mr, Relly I know nothing whatever. Report makes him a very black character, certainly ; and if I were to pass judgment on him with no other evidence than that which this witness depones, there would be no difficulty in pronouncing a verdict. But you know, Sir, Report is rarely to be trusted : like a snow ball I saw some boys rolling along the ground yesterday, it gathers as it goes, and like the snow ball too — when sub- jected to the heat of inquiry, is found to be unsubstantial and melts away. In truth. Sir, I care little about what report says ; and having through the recent proceedings in reference to Mr. Murray — upon whom I always looked as an eminently pious man — had my attention drawn to Kelly, I have read his book on " Union" with great care, quite as much, perhaps more disposed to lind flaws than Scri])tuie truth, and the result is that I am inclined to A STORY OP GRACE. 85 think that Report in this instance is not only gniltj'of falsehood, but calumny." "Mr. Richardson," said Mr. Barlow, with the greatest seriousness, " if the devil could lay hold of pen and ink, I have no doubt he could write a beautiful book — for ' the devils also, believe, and tremble.' You are a young man, and it hardly becomes you to speak thus. You say you never saw Relly — I hope you never will ; and, as one who knows something of the man and of his works, I caution you.'' " I intend no disrespect to you. Sir ; your experience, however, must confirm my opinion of mere report." " There is quite enough in his * Union' to shock an experienced Christian, Mr. Richardson, and tliough he makes a show of a stand against the licentious tendency of his doctrine, it is but a show after all. Depend npon it, the book is most mischievous in its tendency." " That is what I have not yet discovered." George replied, and if the union of Christ with the people in the manner contended for by Mr. Relly be the doctrine of Scripture, the conclusion appears to be inevitable — although he does not insist particularlj' upon it in this work — that all must be saved.'' "And where does Scripture mention such a union as he maintains?'' " If you please, Sir, we will refer to Heb. ii. which I happened to be reading when you came in. But I beg you will understand that I do not set myself up as a defender of either Relly or his doctrine : I would know the truth, and if perchance it should be found with Relly, with Relly I conceive it would be right to take my stand; if, on the contrary, the Bible should be found to echo the condemnation which report so loudly bestows upon him, — I trust I shall have grace to estimate him at what he is worth. From the 14tli verse of this chapter, then," and he handed Mr. Barlow a well-thumbed bible, "it appears that it behoved Christ to become a partaker of flesh and blood in order to se- cure the salvation of the people." " Just so,'' observed Mr, Barlow rather impatiently. " As a partaker of a nature which was under the curse of the law," continued George, " it seems to have been naturally and legally essential that he should bear the curse. Now as all human beings alike bear the same nature, the Lord Jesus Christ must — by assuming our nature— sustain a similar relation to all. And agreeably with this we have in the 9ih. verse, Jesus suffering death — • his possession of the nature capable of suffering and dying being thereby implied — that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man.'' "Fud^'e! — if you mean to argue from this that all men will be saved: tast- ing death for every man is one thing, and saving all is another. Now look at the next verse, and you will see what God's purpose is: He will bring many sons unto glory ; God has maiiy sons (blessed be His name !) but his having many sons plainly implies that all are not his sons.'' "I do not see. Sir, tliat the word ?«aw// necessarily implies a part only; and the use of the same word in other passages of Paul's epistles, suggests, I think, the idea of universality." " Where pray?" " In the 5th. chapter of the epistle to the Romans Paul states that ' through the offence of one many be dead;' now we are agreed that all are dead m Adam, — the many, therefore, in this passage must be all men.'' " The Apostle is only considering the case of the church in this whole passage ; the many, therefore, must be believers and no others." "But if, Sir, 'the many' in the verse I have quoted implies that only those you believe to be spoken of under that term can be intended, you deny the consequences of Adam's fall as involving any except the church." " I do not say tliat that may not be true of all in this instance, which is predicated of the many, but I maintain that the many here spoken of are the elect." "You have admitted enough, I tliink, Sir, for my present purpose : for you allow that in this instance, the many of whom a certain condition is predicated 86 A STORY OF GRACE. though only a portion of the human family, does not necessarily imply that the same may not be predicated of the whole. — Thus, then, the many sons whom Christ" would bring to glory does not necessarily exclude any of the children of Adam, more than the many whom the apostle says are dead through the oiFence of one — though only a portion should be here intended (which I doubt to be the case) excludes from this condemnalion any of his descendants.'' " Well ! you have more to say, — proceed.'' " In the 8th. verse of this same chapter to the Hebrews, all things are said to be put in subjection under his feet ; and this agrees with the universality expressed in the verses I have already quoted ; and then, as Relly shows, the affinity — the identity of the nature and cause of Christ with that of all men, appears to be so clearly expressed in this chapter as well as many other por- tions of Scripture, that, to say the least, I know not how to gainsay the doc- trine. " 'All things,' Mr. Richardson is not at all a specific term ; I should be sorry to stake my salvation upon that, and I think you would too." '• Christ, and not any phrase whatever, is the ground of my hope of personal safety, sir, but what about those who have never heard of Him ? If I found . the Scriptures justify the delightful anticipation that all would be finally happy, I would gladly cherish it. The word all appears to be so definite in Is. xl. 5. ' the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together' as to sanction the Universalist's view. " The passage means, no doubt, that all flesh who would then be living should see the triumphs of Christ, that is, during the period of the millennium.'' " Do you not think. Sir, that this falls short of the meaning of the text when you compare it with the next verse. Here it is said ' All Jlesh is grass' — is not this true of all flesh in all ages?'' " And what if it is ?" "Why that as the verb in the phrase — 'all flesh is grass' does not limit its application to those who were then living, so neither does the verb in the other confine the seeing of the glory of God to those who might happen to be living in some future age of the world .• but that as all flesh, without exception, throughout all ages — is grass, so, all flesh — all who did, do, and shall yet live — shoirld see the salvation of the Lord.'' " And if it were so ; the universal doctrine is not proved, for a man may see what he will never possess." " Well, Sir, I don't know, but on examination, I think it will be found that to see salvation, means to possess and enjoy it." " Human reason, Mr. Richardson," observed Mr. Barlow witii considerable warmth, " never did and never will relish the truth of God. Take care, Sir, that you do not make yourself chargeable with the sin of idolatry, for you may be worshipping human reason and fancy that you are bowing to Revelation. Now what does all you have been saying amount to ? You would persuade yourself that all will be saved, in the teeth of the whole tenor of Scripture, and in ()])position to the judgment of the wise and good in all ages.'' " Thank you, Sir, for your caution, — a very good one — but as an argument it cuts both ways. I do not wish to persuade myself of anything but the truth ; and as to the whole tenor of ScriptiU'C — I suppose that, like the tenor of any other document — can be ascertained only be an examination of its separate parts; and if I were to attempt to incorporate in my creed all that the wise and good in all ages have maintained as bible truth, I should have as perfect a chaos as that described in Genesis. " I admit that on points of less importance, Christendom has always been divided ; but the remarkable unanimity which has always subsisted on this subject renders the individual who would question it presumptuous, if not wicked. Ilelly is as conceited as he can be, and from the way in which you speak, I fear you are a stranger to that iumiilily which so well becomes a Christian, and which should be especially cherished by one who is confessedly in the dark. CORRESPONDENCE. 87 " Not knowing Relly, Sir, I can say nothing respecting his character ; and as to myself " — Here Mr. Barlow interrupted with considerable impatience, " This will not do, Sir, if you don't know your position I know mine ; I shall leave you for the present, and trust that calm reflection will convince you of your mistake. Remember. Mr. Richardson, liow Murray has fallen. The church must and will do her duty, you cannot expect that they will alter their articles to meet the fancies of the unstable. If you should wish to see me again you will let me know ;" and taking up his hat, he made a rapid retreat, heedless of re- monstrance or attempt to get an explanation which (leorge made during the hasty delivery of the last sentence ; and he was left to calm reflection, which the overbearing manner, the ungenerous insinuations, the unmanly shirking of the question he had come to discuss, we need not inform the reader, were not exactly calculated to encourage. George Richardson felt, and felt keenly, that he was wronged; the satisfac- tion of having the best of the argument did net immediately allay the agitation in which his combatant had left him. The consciousness of a pure motive, and a conviction of the propriety of his conduct, however, he retained ; and while his suspicions as to the tenableness of certain opinions were increased, he was stimulated to greater diligence and earnestness in the investigation of the Holy Scriptures whose light alone he was resolved to follow, let the con- sequences be what they might. A few days elapsed : but " The Trial of Spirits'' did not come, and not wishing to have his solitude broken by a similar ordeal to that through which he had passed before Mr. Barlow, George did not send for that gentleman. CORRESPONDENCE. SHOULD THE DOCTRINE OF UNIVERSAL SALVATION BE PROCLAIMED WORLD ? The Universalist.'" to what we consider their legitimate end The paragraph then proceeds — " There is a great difference between the expression ' God loves and forgives sinners' and • God loves and forgives all.' In the one case there is a possibility that God may love and forgive sinners, and yet neither love nor forgive me ; while in the other, there is an assurance that Jam loved and for- given, because he loves and forgives all.'" Wc admit that there is a difference be- tween statements that express God's for- giveness to sinners and his forgiveness to all. We have maintained that the Apos- tolic preaching expressed the former state- ment, and we have challenged Anetazo to produce one instance in which it ex- jiressed the latter to the unbelieving world. The Apostoles .testified that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ or Messiah, the Saviour, and they accompa- nied their testimony as to the matter of fact with the declaration that he that belicvetli slaill be saved, all that believe are justified from all things, wJwsoever belicvetli in him shall receive remission of sins. Thus Peter (Acts iii.) in speak- ing to the Jews and reminding them that they had denied the Holy One and killed the Pj-incc of life, declared, " l/nto you (even such sinners as you arc) " first God TO THE To the Editor of " Dear Sir, — In the last number of the Universalist, page 53, the writer, in his reply to the comments of Anetazo, stated in conclusion that there were still a few other points connected with the subject under discussion which he was desirous of examining. These he now proposes to pro- ceed with. The only passage in Anetazo's letter not replied to is that paragraph in which he makes reference to the statement that the Apostles "proclaimed forgiveness of sins to sinners," and that " until a man sees God's love to himself, a sinner, I care very little about telling him of his love to all men." The paragraph com- mences " Is it possible that any man can see God's love to Idmself, a sinner, who does not see God's love to all} the possi. sibility of this may be doubted." Ihen- we presume, we must doubt whether there have ever been any Christians — any belie- vers of the gospel except Universalists. For our part we do not doubt that there have been many, and that there are many even now. We are not conscious that our own belief of the gospel is altered since we came to see the truth of Universal Salva- tion except that it is clearer and more en- larged, but that only as a consequence of having carried out our former principles 88 CORRESPONDENCE. having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning away eveiy one of you from his miquitics." And Paul (Acts xiii.) in like manner declared, " Be it known imto you therefore men and brethren, that through this man is preach- ed imto you the forgiveness of sins :" every one believing this testimony must therefore, believe that he assuredly shall be saved ; if he do not, he must be looking for some especial revelation to that effect, or trusting to some other gospel, — ^that Christ came to save some particular class of sinners, and be waiting to discover whether he belongs to that class. Accordingly all partialist perverted gospels consist in couditionaUziug and restricting this gos- pel : — he that believeth may be saved; all that believe and persevere are justified ; whosoever believeth and in his acts or feelings, finds or gives evidence of the sincerity of his faith shall receive remis- sion of sins ; God sent Jesus to bless you in givina every one of you an ojrportxuiity of turnmg himself away from his iniqui- ties ; unto you is offered the forgiveness of sins. Not one of them gives the sinner ■when he first hears it, a warrant for believ in"- that he assuredly shall be saved. But this is w'hatthe apostolic gospel does; it is adeclaration of God's purpose to save men, entirely irrespective of anything in or about them to deserve or obtain that salvation The other statement that God loves and forgives all men, was never made use of by the apostles in their preaching to the ■world. It is true that Jesus in speaking to Nicodemus (John iii. 16 — 19) states that God sent his Son that the world through him might be saved; but such ex- pressions are often employed in a general sense without necessarily implying every individual in the world ; besides in this instance the meaning is restricted, — " he that believeth not is condemned already." Moreover Nicodemus was a believer in Jesus (see verse 2,) though an ignorant one, as indeed all the disciples were, there- fore his case is not at all to the point. The expression in Acts ii. 26, " in turning away every one of you from his iniquities" means simply " each of you," and has an indi". idual rather than an universal refer- ence; besides the expression is explanatory of the nature of the blessing rather than of its extent. The declaration of salvation proclaimed by the Apostles, -vvas indefinite in its expression, not necessarily universal but certainly not partial : they did not say that God sent his Son to save all sinners, but still less did they say that it was to save some. In comparing the two statements, Ane- tazo Bays, that in the expression " God loves and forgives all," " there is an assur- ance that I am loved and forgiven." No doubt there is. Anetazo evidently prefers this statement, contends for it, advocates it. He evidently considers it a great im- provement on the apostolic testimony, as recorded in the various examples of their preaching. We do not; nay, as a way of declaring the gospel to the world, we dis- claim and reject it as a presumptuous attempt to substitute the wisdom of man for that of God. In believing that state- ment, he is assured that he is loved and forgiven. Very likely. We can conceive that a man may think that as God forgives all men in the bulk, he, as one of the multitude, will come in for his share, — some immeasurably minute proportion of God's love ; or that he, perhaps, a very little guilty, comes in along with the atro- ciously wicked lor his comparatively small share of the forgiveness. And, of course, we can expect from such forgiveness such love in return : " To whom little is for- given the same lovcth little." But it is not so with the apostolic statement. By it all men are addressed as sinners, each one addressed as what he is — a sinner ; one amongst sinners of the whole human race, one amongst those of his own at;e or country, one amongst those of the little assemblage who may be addressed, one to whom the proclamation is addressed though he stood alone in the world. It shows God's mercy to him irrespective of all others, as if he were of sinners the chief. And from those who see themselves the objects of such forgiveness we should look for such love in return : " To whom much is forgiven the same loveth much. Anetazo says — " He who sees not that God loves and forgives all, may love God in a certain sense ; but it cannot be with a perfect love ; a love that casteth out fear which hath torment. We love hi)n because he first loved us." Yes, we reply, because he first loved us, not loved others or loved all ; and our observation on the quotation would be, that he who does not see that God has forgiven him, can have no real love to God at all ; he who does, will love him without fear as regards him- self, though his love will be expanded and enlarged when he sees that forgiveness extending to all. Perhaps it may be urged that as the apostolic office and commission have long since passed away, all that we can do is to take the record of their teaching as it has been left to the world and communicate what we have learned from it to others without reservation, and have no right to withhold or conceal any part of it from any supposed fear of the consequen- ces. We neither withhold nor conceal, nor have we any wish to do so, nor are we afraid to tell any truth that the ■\vord of God communicates to us. But neither do we neglect the lesson which that word gives us, in the example of the Apostles, regarding the way in which these truths are to be taught and the jiersous to whonr they are to be conmiunicated. We see that to the world at large, whether Jew or Gentile, they proclaimed forgiveness of sins through the Son of God, salvation to REVIEW* S'mners by the death and resurrection of the the Anointed One. They vindicated the truth of this their message by appeals to principles which their hearers professed -. in the case of the Gentiles bringing their testimony home to their consciences and to their own admitted maxims, in the case of the Jews " persuading them concerning Jesus both out of the law of Moses and out of the prophets," reasoning with them out of the Scriptures. We find that this was all they did with such, this was their sole business with them, and it was only when they professed to believe this their testimony and ac- knowledged the Messiahsip and authority of Jesus of Nazareth, that they spoke to them of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God, led them on to the knowledge of things to which the acknowledgment of the divine mission of Jesus was an essential introduction, instructed them as to the manner in which the promises of the gospel were to be fulfilled, exhorted them to go forward to perfection, to run with pa- tience the race which was set before them, and comforted and gladdened them with the glo- rious prospect of a period when grace should abound more than sin had abounded, and the whole creation should be delivered out of the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. It may yet be objected that as we admit that the declaration of God's purpose to save sinners really means to save all, it is only as to the man- ner or way of declaring this purpose to the world that we dispute, and that this seems to be of little importance. If it mean this why not say s«? We think on the contrary that the manner of declaring a truth is not of little importance. By the mere manner of doing it, a statement which in words asserts a fact may be trans- formed into an interrogation implying doubt or disbelief, or the language of grateful praise may be converted into the expression of bitter irony. The two statements we have been contrasting do not suggest the same feelings. But in the first place we would premise that the phrase, " God loves sinners," though often employed, and though inadvertently we have sometimes employed it ourselves, is not a scriptural one. We should rather say that the statement that " God loves and forgives all" does not convey the same meaning or suggest the same feelings, as that God is merciful to sinners or saves sin- ners. Indeed, by many zealous Universalists the word "forgives" might be omitted altogether, for the prominence which they give to the uni- versality of God's love is apt to lead those they address to forget the necessity for forgiveness, and to suggest that he loves sinners, sins and all. Nothing in our view could be more diame- trically opposed to the gospel of the grace of God. Such an interpretation may however be repelled, and it may be contended that the ex- pression, forgives, necessarily shews that all are sinners and need forgiveness. The statement that " God loves and forgives all" suggests, we think, that as God loves all (just as they are) he is disposed to overlook their sins, and therefore finds a way to do so not incompatible V«lth the holiness of his character^ Men, with this gospel addressed to them, find themselves addressed as individuals of the whole human race, objects of God's love : it is simply as men they are ad- dressed, and the characteristic of sinfulness is merely an incidental one. Very different are tlie thoughts suggested by the declaration of his mercy to smnets; men in this find themselves addressed as guilty, each individual as guilty whatever others may be. If they feel themselves guilty, the gospel confirms the feeling; if they have no such feelings, it tells them that they are guilty. It speaks of mercy, or of love to those who are deserving only of wrath, — the execution of righteous judgment. It displays the great- ness of God's hatred to sin, and of his wrath against sinners, by revealing the way in which that judgment is to be executed, and the hatred and wrath swallowed up: it exhibits the great- ness of God's love to man through the greatness of his mercy to sinners. In no other way can the love of God be seen by guilty man except through the knowledge of his grace or mercy in Jesus Christ. That God loves me and loves you, loves some and loves all, and that his love will be effective in carrying out his purpose of salvation to me, to you, to some, and to all, are all statements which we believe and rejoice in ; they all depend upon and flow from the gospel, but not one, nor all of them is the gospel itself. That good news is the declaration of his purpose of grace or mer- cy in saving sinners through the work of his own well-beloved Son. Gladly do we admit that the love of God is the highest aspect in which we can view his character, for (iod is love It comprehends both justice and mercy; they are both alike modes of exhibiting his love. But it is only through his niercy that guilty creatures can see his love. "God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." And when men pretend to see his love irrespective of his mercy, or to seo his mercy tlirough first seeing his love, we can only disavow all sympathy with such views and characterize them as un.scriptural and human r or when otliers, under a profession of believing and declaring the gospel of the grace of God, so alter and express it as to substitute a declaration of love for one of mercy, or in any way by words or modes of expression suggest suuh ideas to the minds of those they address, we can only re- gard them as perverting tlie glad tidings of the grace of God. For our part, we trust that we shall ever be ready to vindicate the simplicity of the gospel of Christ, and with some of that jealousy avowed by the great apostle of the Gen- tiles, shall be prompt to expose and controvert every doctrine, whether it be Partialist or Uni- versalist, which has a tendency to obscure, to corrupt, or to pervert it. For the opportunity of doing so which you have at present given him, the writer has to ex- press his obligation, and remains, Dear Sir, Yours very sincerely, March 10, 1851. EKDIKALETHES REVIEW. A Map of the Purpoae and Dura/ion of the Reign of C/irisf, with explanatory A'ole.i : to tvhith are added a Few Thoughts upon the Contrubt between the First and the Second Adam. By a L.^dy. London: Simpkiii and Marshall; Bradford, Wilts, I. Rawling. 1847. The Millenium. By Willi.^m Seabrook. — In two parts. Sixih Edition. Dublin: R. M. Tims; London: Samuel Bagster and Sons. 1839. Whenever a lady and a gentleman come forward together as candidates for a hearing, in (he Republic of letters, as in every other weil-regulated Common- wealth, the lady takes precedence. VOL. II, o 90 REVIEW. In the present case, the lady— why need we conceal her name? Mrs Morgan* of Turley, near Bradford, Wilts : there never has been any secret made of it — tries to give currency to the system of Millennialism which she has espoused, by means of a map, accompanied with Explanatory Notes. The title of the pamphlet sufficiently indicates the nature of the Map ; and the perusal of the notes will serve to make the reader acquainted with the principles on which it is constructed, and the texts of Scripture by which it is illustrated and confirmed. Concerning the fair authoress, we must say, that she evinces the possession of abilities of superior order. Great ingenuity, especially. The sacred writi)igs she has evidently read with care, upon them she has pondered, and from them she has drawn her own conclusions. With a laudable and Christian-like desire to benefit her fellow believers, she has given the result of her researches and reflexions to the world. Should we not mention that she, and Mr. Seabrook, are Universalists upon evangelical principles? Therefore it is that, however much we may have occasion to diiFer from both, they are the objects of our sincere Christian sym- pathies and respect. As regards some points treated of by our female friend, we are thoroughly and dclight'.'dly at one with her. Although briefly expressed, nothing can he conceived more beautiful, and to a mind brought into subjection to the Holy Scriptures more conclusive and satisfactory, than her "few thoughts upou the contrast between the first and second Adam." Excepting a very few words of her own, strictly in accordance with the mind of the Spirit, these lliuiighls con- sist exclusively of the language of Inspiration respecting Adam and Christ, disposed in parallel columns. What can be better? The contrast is at once made apparent to the eye, as well as to the understanding. Here, blessed be God, we are not called on to riceive Old Testament declarations, irrespective of the sense put upon them by our Lord and his Apostles. Other views of Mrs. Morgan's gratify us, as emanating from the word of God. Our blessed Lord's reign with his saints, we are certainly no opposers of: indeed, so far are we from calling it in question, that his personal appearing, and its blessed consequences constitute the rejoicing of our heart, being to us obviously as well as scripturally the medium, throu^'h which are carried into effect those ulterior ])urposes of mercy, in the prospect of the realization of which we so thoroughly coincide and sympathize with the authoress. The throne of his father, David, Jesus C'nrist is certainly exalted to; and over Jews and Gentiles, made new through tlie power of his resurrection, he sways his sceptre of love for ever. Nay, much as we dislike, and decidedly as we condemn and protest against all Jli'uhlii Millennial systems, Mrs. Morgan's among the rest, on account of their itn.sctiplural because tiiispiiUual character — on account of their making the Old 'I'cstament the interpreter of the New, and not, ss should be, the New of the Old — we are not sure, that in the main principle on which our friend's map is constructed, and which runs throughout her tract, she is alfogether wrong. That there moi/ be a succession of aeons, ages or periods, before the consumma- tion of ail things— that these viay rise one above another, until the whole finally merges in the all in all state — and that to this succession of ages, ter- minating in the grand Jubilee of creation, the sabbatical year and the seven sabbatical years which preceded the Jubilee, Lev. xxv. 7nay have had a typical reference, is not impossible, 'i'he thing, observe, is 7wt expressly asserted, ytfjes of afjes, however, is a scriptural phrase. And the idea of succession which it involves is a scriptural idea. Therefore, Mrs. Morgan must not regard us as denying in toto the truth of the theory which she has so ingeniously, and in a certain sense, so scripturally set up; and which, by means of her map, she has endeavoured to render palpable and intelligible.* Saying and admitting all this, however, we cannot blind our eyes to the fact * Perhaps we m\^M be inclined to p,o a step farther tlian the authoress has done. May not seven, and seven times seven, be understood as terms expressive of indefinitudu? Matt, xviii. 22. And may there not be hereafter »«(/c/«i/«; successions of asras in subserviency to the injinite result ? Observe, we assert nothing dogmatically. We merely put these questions. With Mrs. Morgan's statement of the matter, scripturally corroded and understood, wc are disposed to rest contented. (ilEVIEW. 91 of the scriptural objections to which her theory, as she herself propoundi it, is obnoxious. We saj'^, scriptural objections. For we liave no intention to resort to the aid of carnal statements, and human reasonings, in a matter which divine revelation alone can decide. While we cannot like children consent, at Mrs. Morgan's bidding, "to shut our eyes, open our mouths, and see what God will send us" — wliile we caimot like children be content to have Old Testament texts popped into our mouths, to be swallowed and digested by our fleshly understandings, without reference to those explanations of their meaning which our Lord, through the instrumentality of his apostles, may have seen meet to give — -we are very far from poo-poo-iiig, and contemptuously rejectingany re- ligious system, upon the ground merely of apparetii incongruity and absurdity, " Let the Lord alone decide, speaking in his own lit^e/y Oracles,'' is our maxim. We would now remark, proceeding upon this principle, First, that although in a certain sense they mai/ be correct, our fair female friend's views are partial and one-sided. True, succession of ages is a scrip- tural doctrine. But then it is so only with reference to the constitution of the Imman, or creature mind; and ])e!ongs to that inferior class of scripture mani- festations, in whicli creature views of divine things, and not divine things as they really are, are represented and contemplated. It is a truth relative, not a fruth absolute. Accordingly it justifies only relative, not absolute conclusions.* That God who gave temporarily, typical and inferior revelations of his character, axxA statutes that were not good, Ezek. xx. 25, to the Jews, on account of the infancy of their spiritual condition, and the hardness of their hearts, Matt. xix. 8, in subserviency to a higher dispensation or state of things afterwards to be introduced and developed even upon earth — hatli also seen meet to leave upon record, as indispensable while the time state of his heavenly church lasts, and in subserviency to higher developements of his character hereafter, many exln'- bitions of himself and his purposes, having relation merely to the present faculties and capacities of man. But, in addition to these, he has from time to time, in passages obscure and exceedingly revolting to fleshly mind, suggest- ed Jiigher and absolute views of the heavenly and divine, by which, when they are made to enter into the understanding and conscience by the agency of the Holy Ghost, the other \iews, as relative and inferi^'r, are explained and modi- fied. Succession o' ages belongs to this class of inferior doctrines. Althongii true, it is only relativeli/ so. It involves an idea adapted and accommodated merely to creature mind. An everlastingly present and imchangeable being, and an .everlastingly present and unchangeable state of things as connected with him, however incomprehensible the idea may be by our present faculties, constitute the absolute, that is, the reality of the case. See Psalm cii. 24 — 28. God is the I am. Exod. iii. 14. His nature is the everlastingly present nature. Matt. xxii. 32. f It is the true absolute. In the light of it, and as possessed of it, succession disappears. The importance of the absolute as explanatory of and modifying the relative, or of unchangeability as explaining succession — both revealed truths, observe — we suspect, judging from her tract, the authoress has not sufficiently, if at all attended to. Hence, on her part, limited views of the subject. To economize space and save time, perhaps we may be permitted, instead of quoting them at length, to refer to a collection of scripture statements, as to the distinction between relative and absolute views of God and divine things, which will be found in the " Summary'' given, towards the end of a work, entitled, " The Three Grand Exhibitions of Man's Enmity to God." II. K. Lewis, London. 1845. Secondly, of what is implied in this succession of seras or ages which is a scriptural doctrine, only relative, and not inconsistent with another equally scriptural doctrine which is absolute, we have positively no conception, and while in flesh can have none. // doth not yet appear ivhat ive shall be. 1 John iii. 2. This language is just as applicable to the rera or age which immediately succeeds the present — assuming the succession of seven sera's to be a revealed truth — as it is to the all-in-all slate, towards which each aera as it is successively * See Preface to ■' Divine Inversion," Note, pp. xv, xvi. <■ Tobs read and considered in reference to the Sadducee's objection. 92 REVIEW. developed tends, and in which all of them are ultimately swallowed up. We can no more, while in bodies of flesh and blood, comprehend the one, than we can comprehend the other. Our faculties, with our bodies, must be raised to the level of a higher state of things, before we can be competent to uader>taiid that state. Nothing beyond the close of time, and our new creation completely at Christ's second coming, can be matter of conception or comprehensiim to us. We can penetrate the veil of flesh, only by faith. We htoiv — not as having any conception of the matter, but only as crediting God's testimony concerning it— that when Christ shall appear, tve .shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Ibid. This being the case, supposing us to admit tlie existence relatively of seven successive ages hereafter, corresponding to the seven Sabbatical periods which preceded the Jubilee, we deny the possibility of our comprehending or understanding, while we are upon earth, the nature and manner of working of any of these successive periods. They are of the seaet things which belong itnto the Lord. To act upon the principle that we can understand them, while our present faculties are adapted only to a lower range of ideas, is to substitute fancy for truth, hnmnn speculation for divine reality. Our friend's notion of seven successive ages, not only each sabbatical, but each capable of being apprehended and explained by us, is therefore a little too much of the It doth appear what we shall be, to suit oar taste. — Besides, release of a certain number of unregenerate human beings, at the close of each intermediate sabbatical ])eriod — which, we presume, is what the fair authoress means, for she has not been particularly explicit on the subject — althotigh,in agreement with the sup- posed type, it may be true is, we suspect, associated in her mind, and in the minds of her supporter-s, ^vith the idea of the parties thus released having been so thoroughly purged and purified by their previous course of sufferings, as to be prepared and qualified thereby to enter into glory, before their unbelieving and still suffering compeers. To such a doctrine, if held — and we are not without strong suspicions that it is so— we must unhesitatingly denuir as un- scriptural. It may have found favour with Chauncey, Winchester, Vidler, and Universal ists of that stamp, and it may be favoured by Tboluck and other German Evangelicals, but it must l>e nauseating, as opposed to some of the clearest principles and dictates of God's word, to every well-instructed disciple of the Lord Jesus. There resides no purgatorial efficacy, except in the blood of the Lamb alone. 1 John i. 7, ii. 2. Creature suffering is penal, not purga- torial. Supposing then, the existence of seven successive sabbatical jteriods after or during the Millennium, and supposing the release of a certain number of the unregenerate at the close of each of these periods — we say, supposing, for we have no dix-ect and authoritative revelation on the subject, and where God says nothing expressly, it surely becomes us to assert nothing — then such parties shall be released, at such intervals or intermediate periods, not as linving in any »vay, by means of their personal sufferings, expiated their own sins, or prepared themselves for an earlier deliverance than the rest, but solely as objects of the same sovereign grace, and solely through the medium of the same atoning sacrifice, to which those whom God is pleased to save, by regenerating them upon earth, owe their piesent deliverance. Thirdly, if with a view to meet and obviate some of our objections, Mrs. Morgan sav, as she does say, that "both Jews and Gentiles shall be in their flesh and blood state, for the entire of Christ's reign, viz., for ' the ages of ages,' " p. 7. passing by the al)solute ludicrousness of such an interpretation of the phrase ages of ages, we take leave firmly, but respectfully and with all kindness to remind our friend, the authoress, that for such an unqualified asser- tion as this, we have only her own authority. Her text, Ezek. xxxvii. 25, she merely assumes to have the sense which she is pleased to put \ipon it. So of the texts that follow. Two New I'estament passages, she refers to, Kev. xxi. 2i — 2G, and 1 Cor. xv. 51 : but as, by her own admission, p. 8, the latter text proves that a resurrection state cannot l)e a "flesh and blood" state; so, until she can shew that the Book of Revelation is not allegorical, mysterious, and symbolical in its structure, and until she can explain satisfactorily how the succcsHion of day and night which an earthly or flesh and blood state of things REVIEW. 93 implies, is consistent witli a state where, it is enn)lialically and sio^nificantly declared there sliall be no night, we must respectfully decline her iriterpretation of the former, and the use which she makes of that interpretation as conclusive in her own favour. Could Mrs. Morgan have produced a single declaration of our Lord, or of any of his Apostles, to the effect that " ages of ages '' meant seven successive periods of 7000 years each to be spent by (he Church upon earth, and that during these seven successive periods, — notwithstanding that revealed fact of tlie doing away with the distinction between .lew and Gentile in Christ Jesus, for which the New Testament Scriptures are so remarkable Gal. iii. 28, 29, Eph. ii. 15, 16, &c. &c. — Jewish believers were still to be up- permost, and Gentile believers their sulyects, we should without a word of comment or murmuring have submitted to divine autliority. But it is rather too much for our excellent friend to expect us to allow of her assumino- the phrase Jews, in the New Testament Scriptures, and in the Old as explained by them, invariably to signify Abraham's fleshly descendants; and this, too, in the teeth of New Testament passages reclaiming against the meaning, and giving us, in opposition to it, an inspired orie of their own. Rom. ii. 28 2.9 Phil. iii. 3, Gal. iii. 29, &c. If there shall be seven successive ages or jeras subsequently to Christ's second coming — an allegation of our friend's which without positively either admitting or denying, we are rather inclined to admit — they are ages, or asras beyond time : indeed, constitute a series of successive periods, in each of which, as it emerges and is developed, its predecessor, as inferior and subordinate, is swallowed up; just as time, at the period of Christ's second coming, and thereby in the age or jera which immediately succeeds is itself as subordinate and subservient, and as having answered its purpose superseded and expires. Rev. x. 6. See Greek. With the second coming of Christ is connected, not the continuance of earth and its inhabitants as they now are, but such a carrying out of new-creating efficacy, as shall make earth itself new, and as shall, by making tlieui spiritual as to their bodies, destroy the natural and national distinction between Jewish and Gentile believer altogether.* A period of 49 thousand natural years spent upon earth by believers, thereby kept at a distance from the true and full enjoyment of their Heavenly Father's presence iind glory, which is what our fiieiid the authoress contemplates and anticipates, with either its successive rebellions, successive triumphs, and successive releases ; or, (for she has furnished us with no key to the exact understanding of her meaning,) with its successive periods of Jews reigning over beings in flesh and blood, who in spite of their still possessing and being influenced by an Adamic nature which is enmity against God, are nevertheless in her opinion willingly, submissive to the sway, and lick the hands of their Abraliamic rulers, — a view of things which implies either a trifling repetition which is unworthy of God, and a going back to past and forfeited states whicli is inconsistent with the onward progress of revelation • or, that the first promise, Gen. iii. 15, which has established a necessary and irreconciable enmity between the seed of the woman, and the seed of the ser- pent, while human nature lasts, is a lie — we at once and decidedly reject. Chris- tianity viewed as a continuance, althougli also as he fancied an improvement of Judaism, or the Christian cliurch viewed as the external and earthly improved successor of the Jewish one, was (me of those vagaries of that able and learned nian, the Socinian Taylor of Norwich, which drew into its vortex, and involved in scepticism and infidelity, a vast number of the Clergy of the Church of Scotland some seventy or eigiity years ag). Were it not "that cool, cautious and calculating Seolchmen had allowed themselves to be so long and so awe- fully led astray by this theological moonshiue, we should have deemed it next to impossible, that — in opposition to the revealed nature of Christ's church and kingdom, as the antitype or substance, not continuation of those of the Jews as spiritual and heavenly, not fleshly and earthly — there should have ' been found, even among our warm and enihusiastic neighbours of the Sister Isle * May we not, to a certain degree, plead the authority of the authoress against herself She says, " In the resurrection state, there can be no distinction of nations." p. 8. So say we Re- surrection takes place at Christ's second coming; and, therefore, the distinction bet^veen Jew and Gentile, sejudice, is then no more. 94 REVIEW. parlies capable of anticipating, and rejoicing in the anticipation of a forty-nine thousand years continuance upon earth of Judaism restored, and of the fleshly descendants of Abraham reigning trium])hant over Gentiles, and capable of imagining this state of things to be the fulfilment of prophecy, to be the result of Christ's second coining, to constitute his spiritual kingdom, and to exhaust the meaning of a phrase so profound, comprehensive, and significant, as ages of ages ! Extremely simple, when understood in the light of the New Testament Sci-iptures, is the whole doctrine of God's word with regard to the millennium, or thousand years' reign of our blessed Lord, Almost all difficulties on the subject have sprung from a determination to explain the Old Testament literally, in opposition to and in defiance of the inspired and spiritual interpre- tation of it given by the Apostles, With the j)assing away of the Old Testament Dispensation, at the period of Jerusalem's destruction, commenced as had been foretold* two things : — 1. Gentile Apostacy. Tlie Jewish Chui-ch fallen, as the mystic Babylon, by means of an adulterous intercouse with the kings of the earth, (believers of the truth, 2 Cor. xi. 2, 3.) began to jiropagate her filthy brood of Jles/ilij churches.\ To oui- own day this has continued. VVith but few exceptions, believers of the tiuth have been found in this Babylon. They have not, according to the divine command, come out of her ; and consequently as parla/cers of her sins, they have received of her ploguts. Rev. xviii. 4. Above all, they have not visibly reigned on the earth. This glorious privilege the great majority of them have deprived themselves of, by their fleshly and secular associations. 2. Confirmed Jewisli Unbelief. " His blood be on us, and on our children,'' (Matt, xxvii. 25,) was their horrid and blasphemous imprecation, when clamouring for the death of Jesus of Nazareth, tiiey stood at Pilate's tribiuial. Forty years for repentance were conceded to them. The destined heirs of salvation were, by sovereign grace, plucked out from among them like brands from the burning. But their impious prayer at last took effect. Jerusalem was destroyed. The Jewish Dispensation ended. Upon the Jewish mind was thenceforward stereotyped incredulity, and hardened opposition to the claims of Jesus as the Christ. In this state for eighteen hundred years they have remained. Opposed to Jesus themselves, they have, influenced by the full devilish power of fleshly mind, succeeded in dragging down the professors of Christianity, which in reality is a spiritual and heavenly principle, to their own Anti-Christian and fleshly level. But, hardened in imbelief as the Jews are, they are yet imconsciously and unintentionally witnessing for God, in two very striking respects : — 1st. Ihey are negatively bearing testimony against CJentile views and definitions of the gos])el. By preachers and people, the gospel is commonly proclaimed and regarded as a law with which, it is incumbent on us as human beings, to yield compliance. Little are those who thus think and speak aware, that in such misrepresentations of the glad tidings of great joy, they are virtually setting aside Christ's salvation, and substituting for it a salvation which the creature is to work out for himself. The Jews in opposition to this, are contending for the law of Moses as the last law which God gave, and intended to give. And they are right. 'J'he gospel is not law. It is simply a manifestation of God's character, in the face of Jesus Christ, vouchsafed to the members of the election of grace, by the Holy Giiost. Or, if law, it is only so in the sense in which, when God said, let there he light, there was light. 2 Cor. iv. 6. lie that hath ears to hear, let him hear. Matt. xiii. 9 (see also Rev. xiii. 9) is doubtlessly God's commandment ; but in every case in which it is addressed, it carries along with it, like that to which we have alluded, its own accom- plishment. Jlis commandment is, urn, life everlasting. John xii. 50. 2nd. They are also protestim^ against (Jentile notions of the nature and con- stitution of Christ's church. They are denying by the position which they liavc taken up, no less than by their language, that God ever had or purposed to have any external church upon earth, besides their own. And in this also » Arts XX. 29, 30; Rom. xi. 20— 2;j ; 2 Tlie.s. ii. 6 — 10 ; 1 Jolin iv. 3. t Kev. xvii. 2, .'5; xiii. 18. V.KKXrtfiui ^.x^kiko.!. REVIEW. 95 they are right. Upon the external and fleshly churciies of the Gentiles which, instead of having had like their own a divine origin, are merely the offspring of an adulterous connexion between believers of the truth and their own after it had become fallen and degraded, Rev. xii. 7 — 9, they are, un- conscious tliat they act as the instruments of God in so doing, pouring con- tempt. The false pretensions of such churches, they are unconsciously exposing. They are negatively suggesting tiiat a church which is internal, spiritual, and heavenly is the only true counterpart of theirs. Rev. xiv. 1 — 4.* This state of things is destined to terminate. The Jews as a body will at God's appointed time, during the continuance of this worhl, be given to see and acknowledge Jesus of Nazaretli, wiiom their fathers crucified, to have been the long promised and expected Messiah. Not by returning to Palestine,' and again setting up there a system of fulfilled and exploded institutions, but by entering thi-ough faith into the antitype of Canaan, their own true land, and by being thus brought to the enjoyment of tlie better, because antitypical promises. They will not, as fleshly millennialists suppose, go back, and be the means of reestablishing distinctions which in Christ Jesus have been done away with ; but go forward as then Jews spiritually and really, and as such one with Gentile believers, to pave the way for the ulterior triumphs of their heavenly and glorified head. Their unbilief, and long continued resistance to the claims of Jesus of Nazaretli will ultimately be overcome, not by fleshly views of the gospel, or by attempts to induce them to enter man-made and fleshly churches — the present most approved methods of Jewish conversion, ineffectual as miglit have been anticipated, because human and anti-christian — but by God himself, through the New Testament word, revealing to tiiem the gospel as it really is, a series of divine facts, (1 Cor. xv. 3, 4.) involving, not the imposition of a new law, but the revelation of Jesus the Christ as having become the end of all law for 7'ighteousness to every one that helieveth ; (Rom. x. 4 ;) and by his bringing them, through faith in Jesus into his one spiritual and heavenly Chm'ch, not by his entangling them in the meshes either of their own typical and antiquated one, or of bodies, merely human, assuming to themselves a divine standing and character. They shall be converted, by having ylad tidings of divine facts, glad tidings of great joy, revealed to them by God him- self, and by being raised by him to his heavenly church and kingdom ; not by being obliged to submit to a liunian law substituted for a divine one, or by being obliged to submit to the authority of a church of mere human origin, substituted for that external and typical one which God himself at Mount Sinai set up. Thus and then shall commence visibly Christ's reign on earth, in the persons of men, not merely spiritually enlightened, but as set free from their previous anti- cln-istianand Babylonish associations, enabled to act visibly on spiritual principles. Believing Jews and Gentiles, then one as true and spiritual Jews, shall have no fleshly preachers of what is called gospel, and no external churches. (Heb. viii. 8 — 13.) Something like the Synagogue worship will thenceforward char- acterise them. They shall meet together for the reading of the scriptures, and for mutual edification, not as constituting a church or churches of Christ, that is, not as external and fleshly bodies, but as members of the church that is internal, spiritual, and heavenly, or of the one true church of the living God. In all this there will be to them no accession of earthly glory. The reverse. Opposition to them from all earthly quarters will spring up. (John xv. 19 — 21.) Professors of religion of the fleshly type as well as the openly infidel, will despise them. They will realize the language of David, verified first in Christ Jesus, / will be yet 7nore vile than thus. (2 Sam. vi. 22.) But their true spiritual glory will he great and increasing. The spirit of glory and oj God shall rest upon them. 1 Peter iv. 14. As endowed with faith and love in large * That the apostolie churches were merely part and parcel of the Jewish church.^as external, connected with it, and passing away with it — may be gatliered from their always having had for their basis and nucleus, Jewish believers, Luke xxiv. 47, Acts i. 8, ii. l,&c. xx.'M), x. (hruugkotit, xi. 1, 19, xiii. 5, H, &c., ■IS, U, 46, 47, 48, xiv. I, 27, xv. tlirotiyhoul, xvii. 1—4, S:c. Rom. xi. 16 — 21, and also from Psalm xiv. 13 — ^IG. 96 REVIEW. measure, and evidencing the existence and influence of those heavenly principles, not only by tlie greatest pnrity of life and conversation, but by standing aloof conscientiously and inflexibly from all entangling connexions with fleshly churches, they shall reign visibly on and over the eurth. 1 John v. 4, 5. And this, not as exhausting the full nieaning of the phrase, but as the earnest of what is to follow in tiie time state, during a thousand years. Strikingly thus will be verified prophetic intimations of the Apostle Paul, as to what should result to tlie Gentiles from the conversion to (Jod, of the un- believing Jewish nnfion If the fall of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them, the riches of the Gentiles, hounntich more their fulness l Kom. xi. 12. And if the casting away of them, be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiiing of them be, but life from the dead? Ibid: 15. During the thousand years, as realized on earth, Satan shall be bound. Rev. XX. 1. The world, professing and profane, will not understand what is gin'ng on ; and will be restrained, by God's overruling providence from proceeding to such acts of violence as would ensure the destruction of the members of the church. At last, however, will come the grand outburst, and the ^rand onslaugiit of Satan, in the pers(ms of an ungodly world, on the Church. This will be followed with Christ's visible appearance, with the removal of the church to his own presence and glory, witli the end of time and with the destruction of the world as at present constituted. Rev.xx. 9. 2 Peter iii. 10—12. The true Millennium, of which what had been occurring upon earth was merely the earnest, will then take place. Enjoyed it will be in the New Heavens, and the New Earth where- in dwell righteousness. Enjoyed it will be in consequence of the New Heavens and Earth having completely superseded the Old. Is. Ixv. 17, with 2 Cor. v. 17. and Rev. xxi. 1 — 5. The Millennium in its true and heavenly form, may imply the successive development of seven aeras or ages. It may imply subjugation to Christ, at successive Sabbatical periods, not only of previously unregenerate men, but even of other realms and departments of being besides those with which we are now acquainted. And it may imply, as it continues and progresses, the most wondrous preparations, by means of glory hea])ed on glory, lor the ultimate Jubilee triumph. But the nature and manner of the progress — if progress there be — belongs to unrevealed things ; and, therefore, as regards this, Sir Isaac Newton's langUMge, Hypotheses non Jingo, we adopt as our own. Two piinciples, as regards spiritual progress, whether on earth, or ni the successive ages of the htavenly state, are certainly revealed to us : — 1. That this progress is eflected, not by going back to the earthly, but by going forward to the heavenly. Even in the Apostle's days Judaism, aa "decaying and waxing old," was "ready to vanish away." Heb. viii. 13. And against "turning again to the weak and beggarly elements'' of the law the Apostle Paul, writing imder the influence of inspiration, has entered his sole and decided protest. Gal. iv. 9. See also Coloss. ii. (3 — 23. Upon this principle, spiritual progress in time implied the leaving of Judaism behind Phil. iii. 13, through resurrection to newness of Christian life; Ezek. xxxvii. John iii. 3, 5, Rom. vi. 4; and still farther progress during seven Sabbatical periods hereafter, if such there be, implies the leaving behind of every thing connected with earth, even of the first fruits of the spirit thimselves, and the advancing more and more into the realms of the spiritual, the heavenly, and the divine. Our excellent friend the authoress, (m the contrary, wOu Id have it, that the dead corpse of Jiulaism is to be exhumed and resuscitated — that to it, not a heavenly life, but a re^toleli earthly one, is to be conununicated — and that overwhelmed wiili astonishment and awe at the spasmodic and galvanic energy with which the monstrnus prodigy is invested, the (ientile world is to fall down and do it homagie, and elegant. One of his sons married a niece of the Thomas Muir, (Thomas Muir, younger, of Hunt, ishill, I'.sc]. Advocate), of whom mention has been made. Between Dr. Gillies and Dr. Lockhart, the pulpit of the College Church was occupied nearly a century. X Now thrown open, and known as the nave of the cathedral. It was first seated, and used as a nlace of worship, in the reign of Charles I. The celebrated Patrick Gillespie, oneof the Scotch Commissioners to the Westminster Assembly of Divines, 1G43, 47, and immortalized in one of Milton's Sonnets- Why is it liarder. Sirs, than Gordon, Ct)lkilto, or iMacdonnell, or Galasp ?— Sonnet XI. was its (ir.t mini.'^^lcr. In this church, Oliver Cromwell, it is said, heard Mr. Gillespie preach in I(>50 or I(ir)l : im to be reach- iny forth unto those thinys which were before. Phil. iii. 13. Man speaking to him on the subject of religion, he willingly, courteously, and gratefully listened to. But man's statements on the subject, he was careful to bring uniformly to the test and standard of God's infallible word. Accordingly he made progress. Instead of pacing that same dull round of doctrines humanly conceived and humanly proj)ounded which so painfully distinguishes the great majority of professors of religion, he was yrowiny in the knowledye of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and thereby in yraee also. 2 Peter iii. 18. Without abandoning a single divhie truth already known and rejoiced in, but on the contrary seeing previously apprehended scriptural doctrines in more of tlieir lustre, attractiveness, and heavenly glory, he had from time to time new truths of God's word opened up to him. Rather, by divine teaching, into the meaning of truths recorded and contained in tlie lively and unerring Oracles, he was enabled more and more to enter. To his astonishment, lie found them asserting and proclaiming more than not only the world, but even believers of the truth in general are aware of. Christians trying to confine God's testimony within the bounds of their own huinan creeds, articles and confessions, whether written or oral, and thus virtually whatever they may profess limitiny the Holy One of Israel, were he observed seriously injuring themselves, by defrauding their own spirits of much divine instruction and nutriment. Not that he confounded the pretended nliscoveries of human reason with the teachings of God's Holy Spirit. And not that he conceived human beings capable of teaching themselves divine things, or any more capable of making advances in heavenly light by their own efforts, than they were capable of imparting to themselves the faintest ghmpse of it at first. Every view which implied power on the part of the crea- ture spiritually to enlighten himself he abhorred and resisted. To carry on, as t.) hegin, tiie work of illumination, he regarded as God's sole prerogative. Joint vi. 45. 2 Cor. iv. (3. James i. 17. Negatively, however, when left to themselves, and to human tonching in religion, men he saw not only made no progress, but lendud to letroi^iade. Rom. i. 18, to the end. Enlarged in spirit- ual-mindedness himself, he bigan to apprehend more and more the meaning of Matt. xiii. .52. And yet, this state of mind tended but to beget in him in- creasing attention to the precept, Take heed what you hear. Mark iv. 24. Thus disposed and prepared, I remember well the circumstance' of one of my father's customers putting into his hands a work by William Vidler, on Vniversal Restoration, with a request that he would read it. The event took place about 1808. My father read the book. So also did I. Into my mind, it' introduced a feeling of disgust. This I mentioned. Mr. Thom, witii his usual caution and reflection, told me that be intended taking its statements into consideration, and comparing them with the Scriptures. Many of Vidler's sentiments were, he remarked, clearly opposed to the revealed te&tiniony of God. His attacks_on JOHN TIIOM. 121 the Deitj' of tlie Lord Jesus Christ, and the mannei in which he put aside the efficacy of his atoning sacrifice, shewed a mind far from being taught, and far from being under the influence of the truth as it is in Jesus. '' Nevertheless, inconsistent with scripture, at first sight, I do not find to be every thing that he says. In his book I have met with some statements and reasonings, profes- sedly founded on God's word, which, with my present amount of divine know- ledge, I cannot gainsay. These, I must take time to examine into." About two years after this elapsed. During that time, we had little or no conversation on the subject. Strong reason, however, have I to believe that in the interval, the topic brought under his notice by Vidler constituted the theme of much and prayerful consideration ; and that he was frequently and solemnly engaged in searching the scriptures, whether these things were so. Acts xvii .11.* Few were the works by professed Universalists which he read. Elhanan Winchester's ''Dialogues on Universal Restoration," and some of Mr. Douglas' Treatises, were the only human productions in favour of the universality of God's love, that, subsequently to his perusal of Vidler's, he could be induced to pay attention to. These he strictly scrutinized, bringing them to the light, and subjecting them to the' authority of the scriptui'es. Indeed, he was far more solicitous to know what was God's mind, than what was man's mind on the subject. The first time that I can recollect having seen that excellent, devoted, and most truly pious man, Neil Douglas, the great Scottish preacher of Universal Salvation upon evangelical principles for above twenty years, — was about 1810, It was in my father's companj'. Why they had met together I can- not tell. Some domestic trials had occurred to Mr. Douglas, if I mistake not. He appeared to be asking my father's assistance, and taking his advice in some matter or another. Promptly and affectionately was my father prepared to assist any one ; besides, independently of religion, 1 am sure that there were few to counsel and aid whom he would be more ready, than a gentleman for whom he cherished so high an esteem as the preacher of Universal Restoration. What my father could, I am sure he did. Moreover, little doubt now liave I, hat whatever assistance my father might be giving to Mr. Douglas temporally, he was receiving a rich return for it in spiritual converse and in scriptiu'al in- structions emanating from that worthy man's lips. Cautious in receiving views as divine, and weighing carefully all he heard ifi the balance of the sanctuary, my father, not altogether satisfied, for some 3'ears made no open profession of Universalism. He persevered in reading the Scrip- tures, and in prayerful reflection on their import; committing himself to the guidance of his Heavenly P'ather. The Unitarianism of many professed Universalists was, I have reason to know, long a stumbling block to him.f * William Vidler was, during his stay in England, the friend and associate of Elhanan Win- chester; and, on occasion of the sudden departure of the latter to America, in 1794, became his successor in his London charge. The views of this amiable man were originally what are com- monly called Evangelical. But never having been rooted and grounded in the faith, soon after the beginning of the present century, he made a profession of Unitarianism. f I was taken by my father to hear Mr. Richard Wright, the Unitarian Missionary, on occasion of his visit to Scotland in 1X09. This was in consequence of a most respectable gentleman in Glasgow, an intimate friend of my father's, who was Jof decidedly Unitarian sentiments, having urged him to hear what could be said in favour of their views. Mr. Wright's bold, powerful, independent appearance and manner, I cannot forget. My father considered him a naturally honest man, although totally ignorant of the truth. Two discourses were sufficient for him. — Having perused carefully Mr. Wright's work, entitled, " A Review of his Missionary Life and Labours," London, D. Eaton, 1824, within the last two years, I cannot help bearing my testimony to the courage, zeal, devctedness, and honesty of the man. Few have ever laljoured so hard, and with so great natural sincerity of purpose, to propagate error, as he did. He may almost be styled the Wesley of Unitarianism. With him, something like ardour and enthusiasm in behalf of the cause began to be exhibited, by him it was persevered in, and with him it expired. Into its native icy coldness — its depth of religious stagnation — it has, in Great Britain at least, since the cessation of his labours, relapsed. Could Wright's original Calvinism have had anything to do with \\\s positive zeal in behalf of a system of iicjiation.-i ? His remarks concerning Scotland and the Scotch (pp. 262—307), are curious and wortli perusing. Is lie not at pp, 267, 26S, uninten- tionally making admissions which tell powerfully against a mere secular education, and power- fully in favour of that method of religious training, by which the Scottish mind has been formed, 12:2 JOHN TiioM. Nothing but tlie express declarations of God's word, and the explanations of difficulties which the Scriptures themselves afford, conibiiud with the com- paratively scriptural theology and deep fervent piety of Mr. Douglas, could ever, I am satisfied, have overcome the prejudices, arising from a variety of causes, imder which lie long laboured agaiut^t the doctrine of the fulness of God's everlasting love. Occasionally, my father might have gone to hear Mr. DougLis at a previous iieriod, but it was not until about 1812 or 1813, after partially recovering from lis paralytic attack, tbat I began to discover a liking on his part to constitute one of that gentleman's auditory. Alas ! his ability to attend at his, or any other place of worship, was, after this, but of short duration. His removal to the country and increasing debility, at last confined him almost entirely to the liouse. I should mention, that with the true Catholic spirit which increasing knowledge of tlie truth produced, there was scarcely any evangelical sect in Glasgow, no matter how poor, obscure, or despised, the meetings of which, for the sake of profiting by their knowledge of the Scriptures, my father did not, for the last seven or eight years of his life, from time to time attend.* This occurred, generally, when Dr. Balfour was from home. For his liking to the Doctor's pure statements of evangelical truths, did not extend exactly to the mixed and nuitilated gospels of his ordinary assistants and substitutes. Great were the advantages which, especially in his last illness, he derived from this procedure. Many rich and precious views of divine truth, which otherwise might have remained unknown to him, he had to reflect on. And the Christian visits of many valuable men, whom otherwise he might have remained a stranger to, he enjoyed. Amidst declining health, my father's spiritual-mindedness grew. The onl- ward man might perish, but the imuardman was renewed day by day. 2 Cor. iv. 16. It was in 1813, the year before he died, that the doctrine of God's Universal love, on evangelical principles, seemed at last to approve itself thoroughly to my father's understanding. When satisfied of its truth, he unhesitatingly avowed it. This, by the way, at the time sadly annoyed me. I was then, and for many years afterwards continued to be a most determined opponent of this truly scriptural and spiritual doctrine. To the last, although convinced of the unboundedness of God's love, and unhesitatingly declaring his conviction to this effect, I have reason to think that the subject of the present memoir was never completely satisfied as to the propriety and scriptural obligation of commonly and indiscriminately proclaim- ing it. He seems to have entertained doubts and scruples as to its licentious tendency, when taken up and misinterpreteded by the mere fleshly mind.f What might have been his views in tliis respect had he been spared a little longer, and had his acqaintance with the doctrine, his experience of its influ- ence on himself, and his observation of its effects on society been enlarged, I am unable to .say. Death was all tins wnile making his approaclies towards my dear and disciplined, and nurttired? Among Unitarians, above Richard Wriftht, in point of integrity, respect for the Scriptures, and high-toned moral character, (also vastlj' his superior in education, talents, and learning) I know only one individual, my friend, the Rev. Archibald Browning, of Tillicoultry, Clackniannansliire, Scotland. With the exception of this gentleman, the deaths of Cappe, of York, Lant Cari)enter, of Bristol, and Richard and F. W. Wright, seems to have been the signal for an abanddnment of even the semblance of a respect for the inspired Canon of Scrip- ture on the part of the Unitarian body. * To these I was often privileged to accompany him. Thus in early life I became acquainted ■with the views and modes of worship of Glassites or Sandenianians, Bereans, Scotch Baptists, (A. M'Lean's and D. M'Laren's parties), Scotch Inde))endcnts, (D. Dale's) Walkerites or Separatists, and Universalists, as well as Roman Catholics, Seceders, Congregationalists, Quakers, &c. &c. Thus I had ojjportunities of hearing John Walker, of Dublin, Neil Douglas, Dr. Ward- law, and many other celebrated men. « t In this, if the information which I have received be correct, he happens to have coincided with one of the eminent and excellent individuals to whom allusion has already been made. Indeed, with many, to whom abstractly speaking, the truth of univertal salvation has, on scriptural prin- «iple«, been satisfactorily evinced. JOHN TIIOM. 123 respected parent^ with slow and stealthy but certain steps. Calmly and resignedly, however, and with sweet and heavenly feelings did he meet the foe. "The King of Terrors'' was, as to him, disarmed of '* his sting." Nay, lie was prepared to welcome him as a friend in disguise. OveiTome, destroyed, " swallowed up in victory,'' death was not only in fact, but in my father's con- science, likewise, through faith on his part in the cross, resurrection, and ascension of his Divine Lord. Many Christian friends of different religious communions, from time to time, honoured him with their company and refreshing conversations on the things of Christ and of God. The visits of his revered and beloved Pastor, Dr. Balfour, he always relished. That large-minded, large- liearted, and truly Christian man could bear to listen to my father's honest avowals, without betraying the petty, spiteful, and splenetic feelings which in the breasts of all the ordinary Clergy would have been excited, and would have rankled. Balfour knew well with whom in the person of Mr. Thom, he had to do. He knew him to be a man of deep scriptural knowledge, much enlarg- ed and varied Christian experience, and eminently spiritual* While he acted sincerely, I know that, whatever his private sentiments might be, he acted likewise tenderly and affectionately towards my parent. Refreshing to himself, I have heard my father say, was their mutual intercourse. Not less gratifying to my father, at this period of his life when the shadows of evening were falling thick and deep upon him, were the frequent, sympathiz- ing and most edifying visits of Mr. Douglas. I almost fancy that I yet be- hold the mild, amiable, benevolent, venerable, and Christian countenance of that most apostolic and devoted man. How shrewd and intelligent, too, the expression of his features! Disliking his leading doctrine as I did at the time thoroughly and conscientiously, his kind attentions to my father were to me very annoying. Nevertheless, there was a something about the appearance of the man that always favourably impressed me, and awed me into respect. Modest in the extreme he was ; and yet there was a firmness and a decision of character visible in his whole deportment, which it was impossible for me to overlook. I knew that he was a good man. His singleness of mind, I could not doubt ; and the perfect simplicity and integrity of his conduct constituted the subject-matter of common observation. But how distressing to me to think, as I then did, that having erred fi'om the faith himself, he was drawing my beloved parent along with him. No one can form any conception of the un- easiness and anxiet}' of mind, on my father's account, which at that period of my life I experienced. I could not but see that Mr. Thom's mind was relieved, and his comfort promoted by Mr. Douglas' visits. His love to the Lord Jesus — his delight in him, as his Lord and his God — and the spirituality of his mind, (using spirihialifi/ not in the German and Unitarian, but New Test- tament sense of the term, as synonymous with the heavenly and glorified mind of the Son of God, i Cor. xv. 45.) 1 could not but perceive were on the increase. Calmly, sweetly, resignedly was he awaiting his dissolution. I'/ie swellings of Jordati he was prepared to pass tlu-ough, as one with him who had himself gone down into tlie dark valleij and shadow of death, Psalm xxiii. 4, who had himself co;rte into the deep waters, where the floods had overflowed him, Psalm Ixix. 2, and who had himself thereby undergone the true baptism ; Luke xii. 50, Mark x. 39, Rom. vi. 3, 4, Eplies. iv. 5 ; and as one with this same glorious being who had come up from the valley of humiliation, and sea of an'^uish and death, not only as triumphant over both, and as having rendered their temporary conquest of him subservient to his everlasting conquest of them Psalm Ixviii. 18, Col. ii. 13—15, Rom. v. 21, but as having actually swallowed up death, with all its effects and consequences, in himself the ocean of love and * Not spiritual in the fudgy and unscriptural sense of the phrase, as commonly employed among Unitarians, where, as borrowed from the French spirituel, it seems to convey tlie notion of highly intellectual ; hut spiritual in the apostolic sense. See 1 Cor. iii. 1, and Gal. vi. 1 ; and then compare these passages with I Cor. xv, 45, and ii. 14—16. 124 JOHN THOM. life everlasting. Isaiah xxv. 8, Kosea xiii. 14, Micah vii. 19, 1 Cor. xv. 26, 54. His languagje, borne out by his evident experience, was that of the Apostle Gal. ii. 20. What real, undisguised, profound, spiritual, heavenly influences was I thus called on to witness tlie operation of on the mind of my dying parent! And how strong the impression made by tliem on my memory, after the lapse of from thirty to forty years ! Such an observation of the power of true and heavenly religion, the Lord saw in my case to be requisite. Strong and decided, certainly, were then my antipathies to Universalist doctrine. (The Lord has forgiven me, for in ignorance tliey were cherished and exhibited. 1 Tim. i. 13.) What so likely to arrest attention and impress, as an exhibition of marked and superior godliness, on tlie part of one holding and avowing a doctrine so obnoxious to my views and feelings ! At the time, however, irrita- tion and increased dislike, not acquiescence, was the result. Still, I was pre- served from worse acts of imkindness to my father and Mr. Douglas. How durst I interfere? How could I prevent my dear parent enjoying attentions •which were to him evidently a source of so mucli edification and comfort ? I did not, therefore indulge my enmity to Universalism, so far as to throw ob- structions in the way of Mr. Douglas' visits. I now rejoice that 1 did not. I kept out of the way, to be sure, as much as possible. I studiously avoided being present at interviews between Mr. Thom and the preacher of Universal Restoration. In various other ways, I indicated my disapprobation of Mr. Douglas' doctrine. But his kind visits, I made no attempts to hinder. These he continued to the last. Blessed, blessed be God, that decided as was then my aversion to the idea of Christ's being the Saviour of all men, I was prevented from behaving in a rancorous and unchristian manner, towards its great pro- fessor and preacher, Mr. Douglas himself * But let me hasten to the closing scene of my parent's life, as well as to close this " Memoir " of one who, " though dead, yet speaketh " to me, and whose ivalk and conversation, under the influence of Christian principles, I wish to render a means of speaking to others. Sunday the 16th day of October, 1814, I spent in a great measure at home in my father's company. A presentiment of his approaching dissolution I knew had for some days prior to this occupied my mother's mind, and an idea that his time on earth was not destined to be very long, was, I have strong reason to suspect, not altogether a stranger to his own. Nothing particular, to be sure, to the ordinary eye indicated the approach of any sudden change. He was not to appearance much worse tlian for some weeks, or. months even, he had been ; and his spirits, on the whole, were good, I might even say, cheerful. Arrangements had been made for our going on tiie following day to Edinburgh — by way of Falkirk, where, in order to break the journey and render the fatigues of travelling as little as possible, we were to have spent the first night, — for the purpose of consulting two of the most eminent Scotch physicians of that time on his case. The prospect of a little change of scene, and of a favourable report on the best medical authority, had evidently somewhat cheered and enlivened him. Still an air of peculiar solemnity seemed to all of us to hang over that Lord's day. We even then felt it to be oppressive. And now, looking back on it through the long vista of thirty-six or thirty-seven years, the sense of weight — the feeling of oppression — methinks yet remains. However, by me at least that Sunday was spent not unpro- fitably. Besides reading several chapters of the inspired volume, and receiving from my father many valuable and spiritual sugy;estions as to their meaning and bearings, I brought under liis notice portions of two works, with the study of which I was then occupying myself. These were Hervey's " Dialogues of * Those who would wish to form some idea of this excellent man, and his self-denying labours in behalf of the pospel of Christ, may consult the sermon preached on occasion of his demise, by Mr. William Worrall, his successor in Glasfjow, January lOth, 1S23. We hope to see eie long in the pages of this periodical a narrative of him, analysis of his writings, and view of his charac- ter, from the pen of a gentleman eminently (luiililied to do justice to his subject. JOHN THOM. 125 Theron and Aspasio," and Jonathan Edwards' Treatise on "Original Sin."* Clear and sound, do I remember, was my father's judgment tiiat day. With that strong critical discrimination, which without any pretensions to superiority, and without has'ing had any particular human tutoring in the matter he pos- sessed, and which partly from nature and partly from divine teaching he had derived, he took the opportunity of conveying to me much wholesome instruc- tion, as to the beauties and defects of botii the authoi's mentioned. While expressing his high admiration of Hervey's genius, and approbation of the evangelical nature of his sentiments as a whole, he drew my attenti(m to that verbiage, — that pomp and glitter of phraseology — that profusion of ornament — and those other meretricious graces, by which his style is disfigured ; and found himself obliged to condemn that author's idea of saving faith involving in it necijssarily an apppropriation of God, on the part of the creature : the fact being, as he observed, the very reverse. God through faith, or through the manifestation of himself by his word to our consciences, appropriating us, not we appropriating him. Hosea xi. 4, Rom. viii. 29, 30, 2 'i'im. i. 9, 1 John iv. 19, &c. — Edwards as a man of the proloundest metaphysical subtilty, and capable of the most wonderful abstractions, bespoke highly of. His work on " the Freedom of the Will,'' (which I had not then seen,) he advised me to pro- cure and read; observing that it would require all the attention, industry, and efforts of mind of which I was capable, thoroughly to imderstand and master it. While satisfied with the statements of Edwards, and of other evangelical divines as to our sin and death naturally in Adam, and of the necessity of regeneration, or of a new and spiritual birth from above, in order to our ad- mission into the heavenly kingdom, he mentioned his avei-sion to many of his views, as betraying more of a human, ingenious and puritannical, than exactly scriptural origin. Above all, he censured him for, in common with his class, in his treatise on " Religious affections," and his other works, sending human beings inwardly to study their own mental phenomena and human experience, in order to try if possible to extract from them a ground of comfort and good hope towards God, as necessarily tending to withdraw their attention from the cross and resurrection of Chiist Jesus, God's only means of speaking peace to the guilty conscience, and producing the work of faith, labour of love, and patience of hope. Briefly but very kindly, as knowing my then strong pre- judices on the subject, he touched on the harsh and repulsive character of some parts of Edwards' theology ; hinting at his complete uiahility to recon- cile them with the inspired declarations of God's word, considered as a whole. Thus passed that Lord's day and evening. How valuable to me its instruc- tions, and the spirit which they breathed! Actually, the savour of them is yet experienced by my mind. — My beloved parent having addressed a few simple, affectionate, and heavenly petitions at a throne of grace, we retired to lest, I then slept with him. The following morning, Oct. 17, I rose early for the purpose of making some of the preparations necessary for our intended journey. Having asked him how he felt, and received his answer, "much as usual — I have slept well," I went down stairs. My absence could scarcely have exceeded ten minutes. On my return, I found that my lather had fallen down, in what turned out to be an apoplectic fit. He had risen from bed. — My cries brought assistance. Medical aid was despatched for, and as speedily as possible procured. Every proper and available remedy was had recourse to. But all in vain. Death was in the cup. By eleven o'clock, A.M. the spirit had returned to God who gave it. Consciousness, from the first, seemed to be gone. So that his conversation with me, of the preceding day, was to me his dying testimony. Such were the circumstances attending the death of one of the most Chris- tianly thinking, and Christianly living men, whom it has been my lot in pars- ing through life to know. * In which there are masterly observations on John iii. 1—6. 126 JOHN THOM. Into competition with the Brainards, the Bernard Schwartzs, the Howards, the Henry Martyns, and the Wilberforces, whose names fill the ear, and whose merits have been sounded by the trump of fame, I have never dreamed for a single moment of bringing my beloved parent. Their sphere was a public one ; my father's was comparatively private. Their influence not only upon their own age, but upon succeeding ones, has been felt and acknowledged ; his influence was but local and temporary, and is now principally confined to one individual. But his name and character, nevertheless, deserved to be rescued from niter oblivion. Especially in the pages of a Universalist periodical. Against Univer- salism have been brouglit, by the Orthodox so called, the charges of its tend- ing to licentiousness of principles and practice — of its involving those who maintain it in a Socinian denial of Christ's Deity and atoning sacrifice — and, at the very lowest, of its rendei'ing the mind indifferent to the nature, magni- tude, and evil of sin. Strange to tell, with the orthodox, in proferring a charge of immoral and irreligious tendency against the doctrine of the un- boundedness of God's mercy, have often been found combined men professing religious sentiments the very opposite of theirs. To test the truth of a doctrine, alleged to be divine by its supposed tendency and fruits, is apt to load to false conclusions, Kom. vi. 1, 2, and happens not to be always God's way of settling controversies. John ii. 13 — 17, Acts ix. 1 — 6, &c. Accordingly our produc- tion of a thus saith the Lord in favour of Universal Salvation, is the true, sim- ple, and conclusive answer to all the calumnies, and misrepresentations of its antagonists. But how important, likewise, to be able to confront and confute tliem, by a reference to positive and undeniable facts ! How important to be able to shew, that as God's love to the world through Christ Jesus is consonant with the volume of inspiration, Jolni iii. 16, 17, so also with the effects of which, according to that volume, the belief of the truth is imiformly and necessarily productive ! Now, in the case of my father, 1 find myself qualified to adduce a striking example of the heavenly nature and influence of scriptural views of that revealed truth, which the orthodox so hate and oppose. And in his case, 1 am competent to speak, not from hearsay, but as an eye and ear witness. What confessedly scriptural and spiritual view of Christian truth, and what point of Christian practice did he shew himself to be deficient in? He was a sinful creature ; and he knew and acknowledged himself to be so on the authority of God's word tracing his sinfulness to Adam's one transgression, Horn. V. 12, and thereby throwing light on, and corroborating the suggestions of his own fleshly conscience. Rom. ii. 14, 15, iii. 19. No ground of hope towards God did lie either seek for, or find in himself. It was in the ci-pss of Christ, God's eternal Son, sacrificed for sin, that he was enabled to see, at once sin's enormity, and sin's forgiveness; to see that sin had thoroughly tainted, polluted, and pervaded humanity, and yet to see that sin was thoroughly purged away and destroyed. The manifestation to his conscience by the Holy Ghost, in the word, of sin through Christ's voluntary sacrifice having been atoned for, was what aloiie he found speaking peace to it. He knew himself to be a guilty creature, hut he also knew himself in Christ to be the object of the divine mercy; and under the influence of Christ's propitiatory sacrifice applied to his mind by faith, he lived and acted. Humbled in self, he was lifted up only in Clu-ist Jesus. All this was clearly evinced by his religious tastes. He bore no aflection towards Socinian, Pelagian, Arminian, or fleshly Calvinistic doctrines. The simple gospel of God's mercy to sinners, through Christ's aton- ing sacrifice, as set forth by the evangelically-minded Balfour, was his incessant delight. And equally acceptable to him, was the same simple but certain and gloriou-i gospel, when in somewhat varied phraseology, but on the same inspired authority, and as involving the same divine principles, it was propounded by the impetuous*, but heavenly-minded Barclay, as God's appointed way of dis- charging from guilt, through faith in the revealed fact of their oneness with the Lord Jesus in his death and resurrection, those against whom a charge of guilt had previously been brought, through the revealed fact of their oneness JfOHN THOM. 127 with Adam in his sin and death : as God's appointed way of justifying^ by faith in its gracious and cheerin? message, from all things, from tvkich none could be justified bg the law of Moses. Acts xiii. 39. Catholic in spirit as he was; his ear was open to others besides Balfour and Barclay. He was ever, and de- lightedly ready to listen to any one, by whom CDUsistentiy with scripture, it was proclaimed, that the wages of sin is death, and that the gift of God is eter- nal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Rom. vi. 23. Faith in a salvation com- plete in Christ Jesus, and freely bestowed on the guilty through faith, these were from first to last the heavenly principles of my father's holiness of life and conversation. Thus taught by the Holy Spirit speaking in the scriptures, he was prepared to receive from the same divine source, still farther instruc- tion and illumination. And these were not withheld. He discovered in the course of his perusal of the inspired testimony, that as the living God is especiallg the Saniour oj them that believe, so is he also generally the Saviour of all men. 1 Tim. iv. 10. That to Jesus who died and is risen again, it has been destined and determined, that eoerij knee shall how and every tongue confess that he is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Phil. ii. 9 — 11, compared with Isaiah xlv. 22, 23, and Rev. v. 13. That as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. 1 Cor. xv. 22. And, by faith he had heard him that sat upon the throne, saying, Behold I make all things new. Rev. xxi. 5. Now what was my father that he should resist God? Humbled by the cross of Christ, and bowed down into sweet and voluntary subjection to divine authority by the manifesta- tion of the trutli to his mind, Ps. ex. 3, what right had he, (as is, alas! but too frequently done by orthodox professors,) to call God a liar in one part of his testimony whose evidence he had regarded and received as true in other parts of it ? 1 John v. 9, 10. From such inconsistency of conduct — from such daring and blasphemous presumption — my honoured relative was preserved. Although for a while sorely puzzled and perplexed, and unable to reconcile apparently conflicting divine statements, it was felt by him to be enough, that God had condescended to make any assertion or declaration. Whatever he, found revealed, became to him as such matter of faith : reconcilable and consist- tent with other revealed facts, as having proceeded from the God of truth, he was certain it must be, and, if necessary to his spiritual well-being and edifica- tion, the requisite explanations he was satisfied, would not be withheld. In the mean time, in spite of every difficulty, a believer in the doctrine of Uni- versal Salvation, simply because God had seen met to reveal it, he became. As an honest man, what he believed he professed. And his profession he adorned by a walk and coiiversation becoming the gospel. Evangelical truths previously believed in, so far from discarding, nay, so far from having his confidence in diminished, he now saw with still greater clearness of evidence and appreciated still more highl}', by means of the additional divine light which he found the doctrine of God's Universal and unlimited salvation, to shed upon them. So far from such truths hanging more loosely about him, he found himself cling- ing to them with increased and deternrined pertinacity. His love to .Jesus, as his Lord, and his God, John xx. 28, he found wondrously enlarged. The sovereign good pleasure of his heavenly Father, evinced in the election of grace, — in the predestinating, calling, justifying, and glorifying, of tliose whom he had fore-known — and in the bringing of those many sons and daughters to glory, through their biiing horn from above here, atid their being thoroughly conformed to God hereafter, he felt to be increasingly amiable. And that deep, unsearchable, and indescribable hatred of sin, which the cross of Chi ist displays as one of the grandest emanations and expressions of divine love, became to him more and more the subject-matter at once of meditation and glorying. Gal. vi» 14.* What was there in all this, Socinian or unevangelical ? To his divine teach- * When the life of excellent Neil Douglas comes to ba publi^;hed in tliis magazine, it will, if I am not greatly deceived, be found to present religious results, almost precise!}' identical with these which are disclosed in tlie biography of my dear parent. Would that we had the live? of James llelly and John Murray from some one competent to do justice to the evangelism of their sentiments ! 128 PRIMITIVE CHURCH MAGAZINE. ing, the divine effects exactly corresponded. Increased holiness and heavenH- iiess of mind and conduct sprang evidently from his more enlarged views of heavenly truth. Cast by God himself, through increased manifestation to him, by tiie word, of the truth and import of his heavenly testimony, more and more into the form or mould of revealed doctrine, Rom, vi. 17, was it surprising if he came out of it, bearing more and more its stamp and impress 1 Surely, when we consider the aspersions which by ignorant and prejudiced men are flung so copiously on Universalist sentimenis, and when we consider how few tiiey are by whom these are evangelically held, it was not desirable, when the fitt- ing oppoitunity offered, that the life and experience of such a man, as John Tliom, however comparatively humble and obscure lie might be, should be al- together thrown away. God's truth in its progress and influence, it serves remarkably to illustrate. Shewing an individual under the influence of the scriptures, and of the spirit of God speaking in those scriptures, led on lo the discovery of God's love as universal, from previous discoveries of that love as partially manifested — shewing that superior views of tlie truth, in his case, so far from superseding and destroying, tended rather to throw light on, and thereby to confirm, whatever in inferior views was heavenly and divine — and shewing increased spirituality of conduct, to have resulted in him from the increased spiritualizdtion of his mind by the communication of more enlarged and con- sistent views of the testimony of God — not only does the preceding attempt at a biographical sketch, tend to stop the mouths and silence the cavils of the spuriously orthodox, but it may also, if God see meet to bless it, be found to fling an additional barrier in the way of the spread of those Socinian and spuriously liberal notions of Universal Salvation, by which the United States of America are now overrun, which are so awfully rampant in Germany, and against which it has been the aim and desire of the conductors of this periodical to put Christian readers on their guard. THE "PRIMITIVE CHURCH MAGAZINE" AND ETERNAL PUNISHMENT. In the "Primitive Church Magazine" for July, 1850, pp. 208,209, there appears an article, iieaded, " Eternity of Future Punishment," to which is appended the name, " Dr. Jamieson." We presume that it is a quotation from some work or speech of the learned gentleman. Concerning tliis quotation, or extract, we iiave no intention to speak at any great length. It exhibits some ability, esjiecially of the ad captundum kind. As to its Christian principle, information, or honesty, perhaps the less said, the })etter. Advantage is taken of the common translation of such terms as aiuv, and aiaivios, to speak great swelling words of vanity, 2 Peter ii. 18, and try to impress weak and unstable minds. Complete ignorance of the merely relative nature and meaning of the phrases just referred to is evinced ; as well as of the hint given by our blessed Lord, in his rebuke to the Sadducees, of the nece?sity of testing all views of Ciod and divine things which are relative, by such as are absolute : Jehovah the 1 am or everlastiug one manifested as God, and his divine, that is, everprescnt and unchangeable nature, not a nature like that of man wliicii im|)lips succession and change, constituting the ultimate, indeed the only statidaid of truth. See Matt. xxii. 23 — 32, particularly 29—32. In- sinuations, besifies, are made by the Doctor which might, with little difficulty, be turned against himself. Human assumptions and reasonings are without hesitation emplo3ed, as if they were equivaUnt to express divine statements, in this painfull) unchristian exiract, the man who would sacrifice the infinitude of divine love— Gou is lovl, 1 John iv. 8, IG — to his own exaggerated and false, because unscriptural notions of the divine justice — the man who would impose boimds on the infinite goodness of God, by assiuning to be God's counsellor, Rom. xi. 31, and lo be able to shew what it is fit and unfit for AND ETERNAL PUNISHMENT. 129 goodness to do, Matt. xx. 15 — has actually the unblushing effrontery to charge evangelical believers in the entire satisfaction of divine justice by the cross of Christ, the infinite one in fiesli, Matt. i. 23, 1 Tim. iii. 16, Jolni i. 29, with an intention of " glorifying one [divine] perfection at the expense of another ; " and of supposing, that " goodness is in some distant period to triumph over justice"! Where, ignorant and presumptuous man that thou art, would thy personal salvation have been, had not, in the cross of Christ, mercy to thee a guilty creature, been shewn to be strictly reconcileable and reconciled with the sternest demands of justice ; or, to use the strong and expressive phraseology of the apostle James, had not there mercy rejoiced (marginal reading gloried) agaitist judgment ? James ii. 13. And darest thou say, presumptuous man, that that blood of Christ Jesus, God's eternal Son, which can satisfy justice, and reconcile it with the exercise of mercy in thine own case, is incapable of achieving the same results in the case of any other standing exactly on the same footing with thyself — thus venturing to deny the infinite efficacy of our Lord's atoning sacrifice ? To thine inmost conscience, if thou knowest thyself to be a sinner saved by grace, do we make our appeal ! — But why go through the tissue of misrepresentations, and displays of ignorance of God's word and gos- pel, with which the extract from Dr. Jamieson abounds? Only in the event of the Editor of the " Primitive Chinch Magazine " wishing it, and the columns of his periodical being thrown open to our strictures, are we prepared to analyze sentence by sentence, and then to consider as a whole, such a mass of prejudice, misconception, shallow views of the scriptural system of Christianity, Imman and inconclusive i^easonings, and arrogant feeling, as the extract in question in almost every line of it betrays. This extract or quotation having come xuider the notice of a respectable and pious Baptist — a gentleman who has never professed any sympathy with us in our Universalist views, indeed, a gentleman with whom we have scarcely any, if any personal acquaintance* — its gross ignorance not less astonished, than its total want of common fairness and candour shocked him. Influenced by that honest regard to truth, which is one of the most prominent characteristics of the indwelling and operation of Christian principle, he wrote a letter respecting Dr. Jamieson's article to the Editors of the " Primitive Church Magazine," which appears in the Number for January last, pp. 14, 15. Clear, comprehen- sive, pointed, sensible and scriptural, so far as it goes, is this communication. Well calculated, in our opinion, to induce any right-minded man, who may have fallen inadvertently into error, to pause and reflect. How admirable is, according to the revealed mind of God, the following passage : — " I will only notv allude to one other objection of Dr. Jamieson's to this doctrine, which is, that it has a tendency to encourage men in sin. This being merely an opinion of his own, unsupported by any scripture or fact, I might content myself with expressing my own opinion to the contrary : but I will do more. I assert that * We may have seen him, and we may have conversed with him — but at the present moment we have no recollection of either. This we are certain of, that were we to meet him on the street, we should not be able to recognize him. — His aged, venerable, consistent, respected, and pious father, we have long and intimately known. This gentleman was, during a great portion of his life, a most useful and we have reason to believe a most successful preacher in the Baptist Connexion. In advanced age, he is still a staunch and most devoted adherent to the cause Notwithstanding the difference of doctrinal sentiments particularly as to Universal Salvation subsisting between himself and us, we have always cherished a more than ordinary regard for him. His pure, blameless, and holy life, — his meek resignation to the divine will — his lovet • the Scriptures — and the influence which his belief in their truth is exercising over him — have been too apparent to permit them to be overlooked. Frequently has he in public addressed friends of ours. Although unable in several respects to see with us, we in his leading doctrinal views see eye to eye with him. He loves the divine sovereignty — he holds the doctrine of the election of grace, and of God's everlasting and indefeasible design to bring all its members to glory — he has always proclaimed salvation through the cross of Christ alone — and he is clear and explicit as to the power of Christ's resurrection to raise from death in trespasses and sins to new- ness of life, those who are heirs according to God's purpose, and to whom it is given to believe on his name. Take along with this, our aged friend's illustration of the power of his doctrmal sen- timents, by n life and conversation becoming ihe gospel. Such doctrines, and such a practical exemplitication of their truth and influence, have always rendered this venerable man's minis- trations most acceptable to u: . 130 PRIMITIVE CHURCH MAGAZINE the fact of man sinning with a high hand and outstretched arm, in all ages, notwithstanding his professed belief in eternal torments, as the result, is a power- ful argument against the Doctor's reasoning. Man, in his natural state, requires no eiicouragefnent to sin : it is his nature and inclination to sin, and he can do nothing else; and if he were not restrained by the unseen hand of God, and bv the laws and customs of civil society, a more fearful hell than this world would be, could not be conceived of."* — Tlie letter having been printed (Query — was it because it happened to be written bj' a Baptist ?) is followed by a paragraph on the part of the Editors, breathing the language of ostejitatUnis candour. " [We insert the foregoing, because we wish to afford ' a fair field and no favour.' Perhaps next month, our correspondents, or ourselves, may furnish some reply. — Eds.] " Early in the month of February last, the Janviary Number of the Primitive Church Magazine was sent to us. Up to the time of receiving it, we were eiifireli/ ic/norant of any thing on the subject of " Eternal Punishment'' having appeared in its columns. Indeed, we are not ashamed to say that, until then, w'e were ignorant of the existence of tiie periodical itself. " A Baptist's '' letter we read wiili sincere pleasure and satisfaction. O how refresliing, (alas ! how comparatively rare,) to witness exhibitions of the power of true Christian (always scriptural) principle ! To witness ^//e /ru/A operating as a principle of truth ! At the time, we knew nothing whatever of the authorship of the com- munication. The gentleman from whom it turns out to have proceeded, we never for a moment suspected. Two Liverpool Baptist friends of ours we thought of. But to neither of them did we put the question, as to his having written the letter. In utter ignorance of the source from which it had eman- ated, did we remain, until Lord's day, the 6th instant, (April,) when its autlior was made known to us by a Cln'istian friend. We were, we confess, taken somewhat by surprise. And rather pleased, that we had addressed no interro- gatories on the subject to any other party. Attention to these dates and minute facts is necessary, in order to appre- ciate thoroughly our vindication of " a baptist" and ourselves from an imputa- tion cast on us by the Editor. In the April number of the Primitive Church Magazine, p. 131, the Editor in that Postscript to which we shall have occasion again to advert, says, "Nor can we conceive for what purpose our correspondent [A Baptist] has mixed up questions so distinct, except it be to bring the sentiments of the Universalists by a side-wind into our pages.'' And then, after an allusion to ourselves, " Now we are not aware that we hold any doctrine that we are not prepared at a suitable time, and in a suitable manner, [what time more suitable than the present?] to defeiul from the scriptures ; but we are not all disponed to be drawn into a discussion in tliis indirect, not to say clandestine m men and angels shall detest them as infamous and wicked traitors to their King, God, and Redeemer. And as fugitive slaves are marked and cauterized * Let it not be said that tlie learned and accomplished Bishop Jeremy Taylor, D.D., is not now regarded as an authority in this matter. His writings still live, and are highly and in many respects justly prized. A new library edition of his works has recently been published by the Messrs. Longman, and the extracts in the text are taken from a cheap recent reprint of his "Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell." VOL. II. W 138 THE HELL OF CHRISTENDOM, &C. ■with burning irons, so this infamy, by some mark of ughness and deformity, shall be stamped upon their faces and bodies. (Isaiah, xiii.) So ignominious shall be the body of a sinner, that when his soul i-e turns to enter it, it shall be amazed to behold it so terrible, and shall wish it were rather in the same state as when it was half eaten np with worms. "And that which adds misery to their calamity, they shall be banished from Heaven, and made prisoners in the profound bowels of the earth ; a place most remote from heaven, and the most calamitous of all others, where they shall neither see the sun by day nor the stars by night ; where all shall be horror and darkness, a land covered with the obscurity of death, a land of sul- phur and burning pitch, a land of pestilence and corruption. Into this land of punishment and torment shall be banished the enemies of God.'' " The tyrants of Japonia invented a strange torment for those who confessed Christ ; they hung them with their head downwards, half their bodies into a hole digged in the earth, which they filled with snakes, lizards, and other poisonous vermin ; but even those were better companions than those infernal dragons of the pit of Hell ; where into not half, but the whole body of the nnserable sinner shall be plunged." After describing generally the condition of" the damned in Hell,'' he observes " Besides this, every sense from his particular object, shall receive a particular punishment.'' "The eyes shall not only be grieved with a scorching heat, but shall be tor- mented with monstrous and horrible figures,*' &c. The hearing while it suffers "from the ever burning and penetrating fire," is to be saluted with " the fearful and amazing noises of thunders, bowlings, clamours, groans, curses, and blasphemies." Prison and sanitory i-eform was not thought, of in the era which produced a Jeremy Taylor, hence he speaks of the "unsavoury smells so proper to prisons," as by no means " awanting in that infernal dungeon; for first that fire of sulphur, being pent in without vent or respiration, shall send forth poisonous scent ; and if a match of brimstone be offensive here, what shall such a mass of that stuff be in hell ! Secondly, tiie bodies of the damned shall cast ,'forth a most horrible stink of themselves, and that more or less, according to the quality of their sins.'' And again : "Hell is the world's sink, and the receptacle of all the filth in this great frame ; and withal a deep dungeon where the air hath no access. How great must the stink and infection needs be of so many corruptions heaped one upon another ! And how insufferable the smell of that infernal brimstone mixed with so many corrupted matters! O gulf of horror! O infernal grave! with- out vent or breathing place ! Eternal grave of such as die continually, and cannot die,with what abominable filth art thou filled!'' This is a specimen of the doctrine of " the Church" on this subject. Writers and preachers in our own day have given up more or less of the literal in theif descriptions of hell, and they speak of the material fire and the immortal worm as f iff ures. But while they thus relieve the senses, and overwhelm the " im- mortal soul'' they lake care to remind us thatrts figures they only faintly sug- gest the realify, — that if the symbol be so dieadful, much more terrible must be THE HELL OF CHRISTENDOM, &C. 139 tlie tiling symholized ! If therefore the Hell of the 19th century difler from (hat of the 18th, " 'Tis only change of pain, a bitter change, severer for severe !" To this effect is tlie following from a late leader among the dissenters : — " Concede, or demand, that these can only he figm-es. They are figures at least, of an alarming kind. Why are figures, and of such an order, em- ployed ? Because the naked truth, the absolute reality of the retribution, can- not be set before our mind. It is too intimate, too intense, to be made known in any abstract manner. There is no idealized, soiil-like, language fitted to ex- press and explain it. To supply the deficiency images are songht. But, therefore, it follows that if the full force of these images be understood, still a vast amount of signification lies beyond them, they being, after all, confessedly inadequate, except to shadow out the fact. Nor can guilty presumption more egregiously err than when it soothes itself by the thought that these are only images: they are only images, and consequently what thej' intend is incon- ceivably more severe.'' Hamilton's Rewa7-ds and Puniskmetits. pp. 323, 324. We need not quote more ; suffice it to say that according to the more gross or more refined state of an individual mind, is the Hell of Christendom con- ceived of as material in its punishments after the fashion of the first quoted author, or as mental, after the fashion of the second : but both, let it be borne in mind, as dependent upon 'the supposition of man's possessing an immortal soul. Let us see, in the second place, if anything corresponding to these opinions obtained in the heathen world. The doctrine of eternal punishment is founded upon that of the immortalitjr of the soul. "The Egyptians,'' according to Herodotus* were the first to, maintain that the soul of man is immortal." The Chaldeans regarded the human mind as an emanation from the divine nature. The Persians accoi'ding to Zoroaster, held that '' the human soul^is a particle of divine light." India was early visited by Pythagoras, Anacharchus, Pyrro, and others, who after- wards became eminent philosophers of Greece. It seems proI)able, also, from the adjacence of India to Persia, that the tenets of the Persian Zoroaster modified to a great degree, if they did not form the notions of the ancient Indians, whose philosophy was based on the doctrine of emanation. Enfield observes, that " with all the other eastern nations they conceived the soul to be a particle or an emanation of that intellectual fire, by which they believed the universe to be animated." The distinct individuality and immortality of the soul was most indubitably the doctrine of the ancient Egyptians. The bodies of bad men were publicly disgraced at their death — kings ^eveii not being exempted from the ordeal to which they were subjected. "It was not the dread of this temporary disgrace, however, which the Egyptians were taught to look upon as the principal induce- ment to virtue : a far graver consideration was held out to them in the fear of that final judgment which awaited them in a future slate, Avhere they were * Herod, ii. 123. 140 THE HILL OF CHRISTENDOM, &C. to suffer botli for crimes of omission as well as of commission, and where no- thing could shield them from the just vengeance of the gods. The same doc- trine is put forth in the writings of Plato, who in his seventh Epistle, says, 'it is necessary, indeed, always to believe in the ancient and sacred discourses, which announce to xis that the soul is immortal, and that it has jud^'es of its conduct and suffers the greatest punishment when it is liberated from the body.' " The commission of secret crimes might not expose them to the condem- nation of the world ; they might obtain the credit of a virtuous career, enjoying throughout life an unsullied reputation ; and many an unknown act of injustice might escape those who applauded them on the day of their funeral. But the all-scrutinizing eye of the Deity was known to penetrate into the innermost thoughts of the heart; and they believed that whatever conscience told them they had done amiss was recorded against them in the book of Thoth, out of which they would be judged according to their works.'' Wilkinson's Ancient Egijplians, vol. v. pp. 438,439. Historians trace the j^hilosophy of Greece to Egyptian parentage, and its mythologies and various sects bear more or less the impress of those notions wliich were current among the most ancient people of the world. Conquered by Alexander, Egypt was subsequently brought under the Grecian yoke ; and thus a process of assimilation in customs, manners, and philosophy, was com- menced, which, long after the time of Alexander, was carried on among those oriental nations under the rule of Greece. And hence that confusion of opinion which often obtained in the Alexandrian and Christian schools. In Alexandria, chiefl}', the Grecian philosophy was foimd grafted upon the ancient oriental wisdom. Peopled with emigrants from various countries, Alexandria — built by Alexander with the view of making it the chief seat of his government — became the emporium of learning, philosophy, and religion. Egyptians, Grecians, Jews, and others, were protected in the maintenance of their own peculiar opinions, and thus Egypt became overspread with every kind of ex- isting philosophy. The Ptolemies, after Alexander, for political reasons, encouraged the existing «tate of things. Learning was fostered, the Alexandrian Library was enriched by a vast collection of books, a college was established. What the Egyptian princes had by their munificent patronage effected for philosophy in Alexandria, was by the Roman emperors sustained ; and distant countries were visited and instructed by those who went forth from this seat of learning, for a long period. At length it was taken by the Saracens and plundered of its literary treasures. " Philosophy during this period, suffered a grievous corruption, from the attempt which was made by philosophers of different sects and countries, — Grecian, Egyptian, and Oriental, who were assembled in Alexandria, — to frame, from their different tenets, one general system of opinions. The respect which had long been universally ])aid to the Schools of Greece, and the honors with which they were now advocated by the Egyptian princes induced other wise men, and even the Egyptian priests and philosophers themselves, to sub- mit to this innovation. Hence arose a heterogeneous mass of opinions, of ivhich we shall afterwards take more particular notice, under the name of THE HELL OF CHRISTENDOM, &C. 141 Eclectic Philosophy ; and which we shall find to have been the foundation of endless confusion, error, and absurdity, not only in the Alexandrian School, but among Jews and Christians ; producing among the former that spurious kind of philosophy, which they called their cabbala ; and, among the latter, innumerable corruptions of the Christian faith ," Enfield'' s History of Philosophy, vol. i. p. 539. Greece, in her turn, was subdued by the arms of the Romans ; but Rome, instead of impressing upon Greece its mental characteristics, yielded to the superior wisdom and eloquence of the vanquished ; and the conquerors, con- trary to the common result, adopted the opinions and manners of the conquered. Under the Empire, the Roman poets and historians unquestionably received the tincture of the Grecian philosophy. From the Eclectic sect, which took its rise in Alexandria, Christianity, already sadly distorted by Judaizing teachers and Gentile philosophy, towards the end of the third century, received still further corruption. " In the infancy of the Alexandrian School," says Enfield, " not a few among the professors of Christianity suffered themselves to be so far deluded by the pretensions of this sect, as to imagine that a coalition might with great advantage be formed be- tween its system and that of Christianity ; and this union seemed the more desirable, as several philosophers of this sect became converts to the Christian faith. But the consequence was that Pagan ideas and opinions were by degrees mixed with the pure and simple doctrines of the gospel ; the fanatical philo- sophy of Ammonius corrupted the pure religion of Christ; and his church became a field of contention, and a nursery of error." In Judea, in consequence of the conquests of Alexander, the Jews, contrary to their ancient habits, mingled much with foreigners; "a circumstance," says Enfield, " which, left to its natural operation, would have led them impercep- tibly into the adoption of foreign opinions and customs." The influence of their Alexandrian brethren was also pernicious, and so manifest was the effect of Grecian philosophy and the Egyptian mysteries under the joint reign of Aristobulus and Hyrcanus, that some of the zealous advocates for the purity of the Jewish faith and worship denounced anathema upon any who should teach Grecian wisdom to his children. " No anathema however," says Enfield, " could prevent the spread of Grecian learning among the Jews." Our space forbids a uotice of the Jewish sects generallj'. The Pharisees were the most influential and important. They not only held the doctrine of the soul's immortaiitj', but that of metempsychosis. The doctrine of transmi- gration was admitted by the Pharisees ; their belief, according to Josephus,* being, " that all souls were incorruptible ; but that those of good men were only removed into other bodies, and that those of the bad were subject to eternal pimishment."f " Starting from the development of certain ideas, which the Old Testament * Bell. Jud. ii. 8, 14. t The Buddhist, and other religions have admitted the same notion of the soul of man passing into the bodies of animals ; and even the Druids believed in the migration of the soul, though they confined it to human bodies. Cses. Bell. Gal. lib. vi."— Wilkinson's Ancient EgispiUms, vol. v. p. 448. 142 THE HELL OF CHRTSTKNDOM, &C. really contained in the germ, they formed their system by combining witli it many of tlie elements derived from Zoroastrian or Parsic opinions ; and at a later period (after the time of Gamaliel) with much also that they borrowed from Platonism." Neander's Church History, vol. i. The space we have designed for this article precludes our giving anything like a complete historical sketch of the subject, though by doing so we should doubtless obtain a much more advantageous position from which to compare the belief of the Christian with the heathen world. We have introduced so much of history, however, to assist us to account for as well as discover the identity which subsists between the hell of heathendom, and the hell of Christendom. The notions entertained by our own Saxon forefathers on the subject of a future state must not pass unnoticed. To how large an extent is the present cast in the mould ot the past ! And how true, in reference to opinions as well as other things, the words of the wise man, "The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be." " HEL. — Among the fearful beings whose power was dreaded even by the gods, was Hel, misti-ess of_ the cold and joyless under-world. Called, through the fate of battles, to the glories of Waelheal, the Teutonic or Norse hero trembled at a peaceful death, which would consign him to a dwelling more desolate and wretched than even that which awaited the fallen warriors of heroic Greece, and many a legend tells of those whose own hand saved them from a futurity so abhorred. But Hel was not herself the agent of death ; she only received those who had not earned their seat in Opin's hall by a heroic fall, and the Waelcyriau or Shieldmays were the choosers of the slain. The realm of Hel was all that Waslheal was not,— cold, cheerless, shadowy ; no simulated war was there, from which the combatants desisted with renovated strength and glory ; no capacious quaighs of mead, or cups of the life giving wine ; no feast continually enjoyed and miraculously reproduced ; no songs nor narratives of noble deeds ; no expectation of the last great battle where the einherjar were to accompany AUfather to meet his gigantic antagonists ; no flashing Shieldmays animating the brave with their discourse, and lightening the hall with their splendour : but chill and ice, frost and darkness ; shadowy realms without a sun, without song or wine or feast, or the soul-inspiring company of heroes, glorying in the great deeds of their worldly life. " For the perjurer and the secret murderer Ndstrond existed, a place of torment and punishment — the strand of the dead— filled with foulness, peopled with poisonous serpents, dark, cold, and gloomy : the kingdom of Hel was Hades, the invisible, the world of shadows : Nastrond was what we call Hell. Christianity however admitted no goddess of death, and when it was thought necessary to express the idea of a place of punishment after death, the Anglo- saxon united the realm of Hel with Nastrond to complete a hideous prison for the guilty : the prevailing idea in the infernal regions of the Teuton is cold and gloom ;* the poisonous snakes, which waking or sleeping seem ever to have haunted the Aiiglo-saxon, formed a convenient point of junction between his * " Fire was too cheerful in the north to be sufficiently an object of terror : it appeared other- wise in the east, where coolness is the greatest of luxuries." THE HELL OF CHRISTENDOM, &C. 143 own traditional hell and that which he heard of from the pulpit, in quotations from the works of the Fathers ; and to these and their influence alone can it be attributed when we find flames and sulphur, and all the hideous apparatus of Judaic tradition, adopted by him. In this fact seems to me to lie a very important mark of ancient heathendom, and one which the clergy themselves admitted, a belief in which they shared, and which they did not scruple to impress upon their flocks, even in spite of the contrary tendency of their autho- rities : it will be sufficient to refer to the desciiption given of hell in the poetic Saloman and Saturn, a composition redolent of heathendom : on the defeat of the rebel angels, it is said, God ' for them he made a hell, a dwelling deadly cold, with winter covered : water he sent in and snake-dwellings, many a foul beast with horns of iron ; bloody eagles and pale adders ; thirst and hunger and fierce conflict, mighty terror, joylessness.' "Even in their more orthodox descriptions, ecclesiastical poets, though naturally adopting the Judaic notions, cannot always shake off" the old, habitual tradition of their forefathers, but recur to the frost, gloom, and serpents of Niistrond, and the realm of Hel ; of which a passage already quoted from Beda is ample evidence." — Kemble's Saxons in England, vol. i. pp. 392 — 395. We have seen, from the valuable work of Kemble, how the current doctrine among us was, through Judaizing Christian teachers, grafted upon the old Anglo-Saxon hell ; and enough has been said to shew how the Jews, through their intercourse with heathen nations, adopted heathen notions, — notions with very little modification maintained throughout the Christian world in the pre- sent day. Some features may not be traceable upon the docti-ine as now held which were conspicuous in ancient times, and some characteristics of the bell of modern times may not be found in that of antiquity. But from what we have adduced respecting the latter it may be seen, even to the very phraseo- logy, how remarkably coincident are their leading features with those of |fhe Hell of Christendom. That the heathen in their notions respecting the soul and its immortal des- tiny, came very near to the truth we have often been told by orthodox divines, and the striking coincidences between their philosophical tenets and what are assumed to be the teachings of divine revelation have been insisted on as so many proofs of the genuineness of natural religion. Need we, then, enter at length into a discussion of that which is generally admitted and even insisted on by our opponents? By them is the identity claimed, — by us it is readily conceded. But as evidence of the truth and reality of either the immortality of the soul or the doctrine of eternal torments, we emphatically deny that it 144 THE GREAT EXHIBITION. has any claim to be, on the same grounds that we dispute the claims of what is commonly called natui-al theology. We conclude this part of our subject in the words of Professor Stuart of Andover, no mean authority on such a question as this. He says, "The Amenti of the Egyptians, corresponded to the Hades of the Greeks, and the Tartarus of the Latins.'' Mr. Stuart also identifies the orthodox hell with the heathen Tartarus; and he might have added, the Nastrond of the Anglo- Saxons. {To be concluded iu our next.) THE GREAT EXHIBITION. "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." — John xii. 32. The most glorious display of " The Industry of all Nations '' at the present period attracts everybody's attention and secures the admiration of the rich and the poor, the old and the young, the wise and the simple, the foreigner and the native. The mind of the thoughtful is drawn to it as by necessity, and the ideas engendered by its contemplation are vivid, multifarious, expansive and enduring. For ourselves it supplies delightful retrospections and still more ecstatic anticipations on subjects of a character infinitely more important than that which prompted them; as much so as "things which are eternal '' ai-e be- yond, in weight and moment, "things which are temporal and seen.'' We said "retrospections,'' for we are called to look back on the grand exhi- bition within the broad and deep expanse of the wonder-studded past. And what see we there? We see God opening His hand and flinging buoyantly forth innumerable worlds to occupy, enlighten and empeople a portion of bound- less space. To '' the sons of God,'' that "sang together," — to " the innumerable company of angels," what a deeply interesting, what an incalculably glorious exhibition was this ! The manifestation of God's natural pertections, in a plenitude that caused these pure and blissful spirits to shout aloud for joy! 'I'hen light, the most perfect image of its Maker, glowed through the universe the homage that was its duty, and m)7id gratefully dwelt on the glorious theme, because wholly for it this great exhibition was planned and made ! Then man was formed in the image of God, — the creature from the mere "dust of the earth," with a power to perceive, love, serve, and adore his Creator, by an immaterial, incorruptible principle within. Then the creature man opened to other creature-minds the wisdom, power, and goodness of God ; and wonder- ment occupied each individual faculty at what may have to follow this luminous but mysterious displa}' of divine purpose, and what the progressive develop- ments of His glory and His praise ! Was not that a great exhibitioii when man fell and became so corrupt that God sent the deluge to punish and destroy the inhabitants of the earth? was not that, when in thunderings He proclaimed His law to a trembling, conscience-smitten world? was not that, when He gave the far-seeing infallible prophecies, to prove the authenticity of His religion, and supreme excellence of His name? But especially was not that when the Son of His love came on earth to suffer, fulfil the law, and die a sacrifice for guilty but heaven-favoured man ? O ! was not that a great exhibition ? Look at the invidenis: — In that life what an unravelment of divine grandeur! what an opening of the scroll of heavenly inscription to universal gaze ! what a^^dis- embowclnicnt of hidden treasures— of mental depths! What a study for all the genius, all the talents of all that live. The manger-birth! The angel- anthem ! The cloven skies, and the voice of God ! The diiscrt-struggle, and its victory ! The sound of the gospel trumpet I The parting supper ! Then THE GREAT EXHIBITION'. 14o awful garden ! The base betrayal! The bloody cross! The myatic tomb! The glorious resurrection ! The ascension to the throne of light I What scenes of wondrous, miraculous, moral, intellectual, spiritual mightiness ! — holy crea- tions ! — refulgent manifestations ! and magnificent instrumentalities ! all by the one quiet, unobtrusive, humble, and even ignominious existence of a lonely being, who thus could manifest the whole of Deity for the weal of the whole of His creatures, — the whole of goodness for the sake of all that is bad, — God for man — "Exhausted Deity on human weal." What an exhibition, was this ! But look at its momentous consequences — the conversion of the world, the establishment of His kingdom ; the spread of His Truth ; on. on, on, even until the greatest display of the Godhead will be given when it shall be said, — " Then cometh the end," when will be " gathered together in one all things in Christ, which are in heaven, and which are on eaith;" when "God shall be all things to everytliing ;'' when " there shall be no more pain ;'' no more death;'' when "sorrow and sighing shaW flee away;" when God's oath, by Himself and His own Being, shall literally be verified, that "unto Him shall everg knee how and everg tongue confess," " wlio worketh all things after the counsel of His own will ;" when Christ shall have " deslrogeJ the works of the devil" — " drawn all men unto Him ;" when " all flesh sliall see the salvation of God;" "old things are passed away, and all things made new ; and when every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and sucli as are in the sea, and all that are in them, shall be heard saying. Blessing and honor and glory and power be unto Him that sitteth upon the tlirone and un- to the Lamb for ever and ever!" will not this be an exhibition of God's mind, purpose and glory, such as will fill the universe with amazement, joy and an- thems of praise ? And then the largeness, the grandeur, of the boundless, \\o\y spectacle ! The per- fection o^ everg department thereof] the unitg, appropriateness and completettess of the gigantic whole! hi hnnian displays, even of the most costly character Imperfection somewhere or somehow is the necessary accompaniment; the finger of "Fallibility" must be impressed ; the creature- failing, can never be absent ! But here in God's great exhibition, not one blur, not one defect can ever appear! This work cost Heaven its largest, divinest architectural and munificent capabilities, to design and elaborate ; took millions of vears to found and fabricate; and on it rests, for entirety, beauty, order and glory, all its name, all its views, all its very exisfencel The complicated but symetrical exhibition, the achievemerit of a God, with all His Infinite Perfections wliollg engaqed in the mighty work !— all that ever He made administering to His matchless theme! The worm with its perfect mechanism of structure joins the cherub, with his holy greatness of thouglit, speed and power to do ! — Man, with his puny arm, unwittingly, bg opposing, serr^s ! Devils, with larger thoughts and bolder enterprise, only niore grandly — doing the same ! Worlds, unconsciously rushing through immensity in every " silence speaking His praise !" animalculae — a myriad in a dew drop — doing no less\ Every ray from every puny taper magnify in^^- His Wisdom, — the innumerable beamings from a thousand suns, doing no more — no lessl The glowworm and the comet, — each needful, each alike administrative to the completeness of the picture of Divine execution ! The darkest midnight, the most broad and deeply mys- terious evil, as much as the most splendid sunshine, and most conspicuous ^roor/, all alike " woiking'' for the perfection of the mysterious yet simple and m- effably glorious €«pondence from "a Baptist" which, as it speaks for itself, requires nothing further by way of introduction. To the Editor of " The Universalisf." SiH,— The Editor of the rrimilivc Church Magazine having refused insertion AND ETERNAL PUNISHMENT. 147 to my reply to his "Editorial Postscript'" in tlie April number, contluct upon which I will mnke no comment, I sliall be obliged by your inserting a copy, which, antici|)ating such a course, I have kept. I would also take this opportunity of confirming, in every particular, tha statement of Dr. Thom in reference to this subject in your number for the present month. Yours truly, Llverpoof, May 7, 1851. A BAPTIST. To the Editor of the ^'Primitive Church Magazine." Sir, — I cannot allow your editorial remarks upon my letter in the January No. to pass unnoticed, aiul I appeal to your sense of justice for the insertion of tin following : Voiir imputation tliat my letter was written for the purpose of clandestinely introducing another subject by a side-wind, I most emphatically deny, and I liad not the slightest knowledge of any other persons, either here or elsewhere, having written you on the subject. In my view of the subject, the non-eternity of punishment for sin, and the universal salvation of the human race, are inseparably connected. All schemes seeking to prove the anniliilation of the unregenerate, or a purgatorial and li- mited state of suffering, I reject as unscriptura', and can only sec the punish- ment of sin taken away by the sacrifice and atonement of the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, who came to destroy death and him that had the power of death, that is, the Devil; and so manifest Eternal Life as the gift of God. As you have imputed motives to me, I would ask, to what motives am I to impute your refusal to allow this subject to be discussed in your pages, after having devoted so large a space to the endeavour to establish the eternity of future punishment? The present is a question of far greater importance than the controversy which called your Magazine into existence. My only desira is to discuss it on scriptmal principles, and truth (like gold in the crucible) never loses any thing lay being tried. It is not sufficient answer to say that_f/r)?< cannot receive the docti'ine of Uni- versal Salvation, if that doctrine can be proved from the word of God. I do not mean the uncertain salvation, dependent on the will of man, as taught by Arminians, but a certain, eternal, imconditioiial salvation, according to the scriptures of truth, and shining there from the first promise to the end of th» Book. There are many questions involved in this subject, whicli 1 am willing to discuss if opportunity is afforded, both from the general principles of Scripture, and the revealed character of God, "who is the Saviour of all men, specially of them that believe" (1 Tim. iv. 10). 1 maintain firmly the special salvation of the election of grace, by the revelation of Jesus Christ in them, but I think I can see also the ultimate salvation of every creature, " who shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God (Rom. viii. 21)." I would refer you to the 5lh chapter of Romans for the inspired testimony as to the universality of the imputation of sin in Adam and of righteousness in Christ to evei-y man, and to the summary in the ISih verse of that chapter, "as by the offence of one judgment came upon «// men to condemnation, even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon fill men unto justifica- tion of life'' — for, "as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive." (1 Cor. XV. 22). If universal salvation be taught, as I conceive it is, in so plain and dislincl a manner in the word of God, it is obvious that the passages which appear to teach an eternal life in misery must have another meaning than that romiiionly ascribed to them, for there is no contradiction in the word of God, all is hat- rnony and truth, and if we see it not it is owing only to the darkness of ouv minds; "in Him is ho darkness at all.'' 1-18 f ORRESPONDENCK. With regard to the fear of eternal torments having any influence in restrain- ing man from sin, and the o|)positc doctrine being dangerous, as taking off that restraint, I cannot see that you have at all answered tlie statement I before made. Unregenerate men act only from the fear of man, '• there is no fear of God befoi-e their eyes (Rom. iii. 18), tliey know not God, but are at enmity with liim and tlie aboundings of iniquity are only restrained by the mighty but unseen hand of God in his providence, who in effect, says to every man, " Hi- therto shall thou go but no further," and man has no more power to commit sin than he has to make himself rigliteous, but as he is permitted by his Maker (John xix. 11). The proof, or illustration, you adduce in support of your view, is that of a person quickened to feci himself a sinner; on such the dread of the anger of God luis an effect such as you describe, until the love of God is shed abroad in his heart, and lie sees that " the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." I remain, Yours truly, (Signed) A BAPTIST. CORRESPONDENCE. Should the doctrine of Universal Salvation be proclaimed to the world? Dear Sir,— A letter from Anetazo in No. 14 havin;,' Riven occasion for a replv from Ekdik- alethes published in Nos. 15 anti"l6 of the Uni- versalist. Anetazo finds himself constrained to make a few remarks on the reply, the author of which beins so much according to Anetazo's own heart, and some of his sentiments so com- pletely in harmony with his own— there cannot be much difference between them in anv thing of real importance. Both correspondent's ayree in the following statements contained in the replv. "Vt'c neither withold nor conceal, nor have we any wish to do so, nor are we afraid to tell any truth, that the word of God com- municates to us. We contend for proclaiming the apostolic gospel, the glad tidings of God's mercy to sinners, salvation God's gift to the guilty. The gospel really means the salvation of all men however men may misunderstand it. We should have no hesitation in placing the scriptures in the hands of unbelieving men. — That God loves me, and loves vou, and loves all, and that Iiis love will be effective in carry- inf: out his purpose of salvation to me, to you, to f^me, to all— are all statements which we beiitvc and rejoice in." Being both agreed in these statements they must therefore be agreed that " God's universal love" may be i)roclaimed to all. The chief ditference seems to be in the manner of proclaiming it. Ekriikalelhcs says, " the gospel preached by the apostles was, God loves and forgives sinners." Anetazo says, "The fulness of the blessing of the gospel of Christ is not preached unless when it is pro- claimed, that God loves and forgives all." Ane- tazo is challenged to produce one instance in which the apostolic preaching expressed the latter to the unljclieving world. Without as- sumption, or presumption, we think it may be concluded that the apostles would adhere to the rules of their commissinn. They were sent forth to prcacli the gospel to ccer// creature. To them was committed the word of reconcili- ation, which is this, "God was in Christ re- conciling the world unto himself not imputing their Iresjiusses unto them." This is a procla- mation of the universal love and forgiveness of God to all. " In thy seed shall all the km- dreds of the earth be blessed ;" this is the gospel and was prodaiiued t)y the apostle to those. who denied the Holy one and the Just, who with wicked hands crucified and slew Jesus of Nazareth. Acts. iii. 26. This gospel was also preached to the unbelieving Galatians. Gal. iii. 20. Let this do for one instance at present. Read I Cor. xiv. there you will find the con- gregation of believers, commanded for the sake of the unlearned and unbelieving, to speak in words easy to be understood, that the un- learned and unbelieving who might come in might hearo/Z that was proclaimed to believers. Where then, or why, the distinction between the preaching the universal love of God to be- lievers, and theproclaimingof it to unbelievers, when both parties are to hear all proclaimed? But we should do as they (the apostles) did : so says the reply. Of the apostles Jesus said he that beareth ynii heareth me. This cannot be said of us. Unless we speak as the Oracles of God, without adding to, or taking away from the sayings of the lievelation of God Our teaching and proclaiming is merely human — by the icill of man; not as before tlie scriptures were completed, by the will of God. Man may now tell his brother man that he is fully per- suaded that the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are true and divine, but he cannot make his brother see that it is so — God only can so persuade and teach In this the most loarnea man under the sun, can do no more than an ass and colt could do, if like Balaam's ass it could speak in a human tongue. We are allowed to "answer every man who asketh us a reason of the hope that is in us, with meek- ness and fear." He who asketh, whether he is a believer or an unbeliever, may be told that we have the hope of eternal life because God who cannot lie promised it before the world began. Titus i. 2. — that we hope for glorious liberty, because the whole creation is subjected in this hope, Rom. viii. 20. and shall be deliver- ed,— that we have the hope of salvation, be- cause God will have all men to be saved, and his will ever was, is, and shall be done on earth and in heaven, — that we believe Adam enjoy- ed the hope of eternal life, and understood the love and forgiveness of God to be universal because it was promised before the world be- gan — promised in the words addressed to the unbelieving serpent, before Adam was driven CORRESPONDKXCE. 149 out of the garden to till the ground, whioli was at the beginning of the world. We believe that Abraham so understood God's love and forgive- ness : he looked for a better country and no doubt for a blessmg far superior to the tempo- ral blessings of Palestine. We do not think Nicodemus was a believer in the Son of God when he first came to Jesus by night — he did not believe earthly things — he was not born of God — how could he believe in the Lord from heaven ? There is no doubt that he became a true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. We think the passage Matt. vii. 6, " Give not that ■which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine," is by many misun- derstood. The passage should not have had a paragraph prefixed. It is in close connexion with the sayings of Jesus going before, and ought to be understood as forbidding the prac- tice of parading our fasting, praying, and alms- giving hejore the world to be teen of men. We do not think that the passage has any reference to the manner of preaching the gospel. But after answering those who ask us a reason of the hope that is in us, we ought by all means to guard against using any expression that may have a tendency to lead those addressed, to imagine that what we have stated is an "im- provement" on the apostolic testimony, or an attempt to substitute the wisdom of man for the wisdom of God. All that we can state, over or under, the bare words of the Bible, is neither more nor less, nor else, than mere human opinion. It appears that Ekdikalethes is afraid that the preaching of forgiveness of all to un- believers is apt to suggest the thought that as God loves all, just as they are, he is disposed to overlook their sins, and thereby hide the dis- play of the greatness of God's hatred to sin and wrath against sinners. Anetazo is afraid that keeping back the proclamation of God's love and forgiveness of all, has a tendency to sug- gest, that sinners must be otherwise than as they are ere they can expect that God's love and forgiveness will be extended to tbem, and may thereby raise that smoke of the bottomless pit, which breathes forth, "stand by thyself, come not near me, I am holier than thou. Both cor- respondents thus seem afraid of "limiting the Holy One of Israel." The one of limiting his hatred and wrath — the other of limiting his impartiality and love. Acts xiii. is rejected as being one instance of the Apostles' proclaiming God's universal to unbelievers. Anetazo continues to look upon it as an instance to the very point of the challenge. The audience of the apostle at that time consisted of contradicting, despising and blaspheming Jews, and demon-worshipping Gentiles, not a believer or true worshipper of the Father amongst them, so far as we can learn. — To these Paul proclaimed '• I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles that thou shouldest be for salvation to the ends of the earth." Can there be a proclamation of a more universal salvation than this? We maintain that the Jews understood it so, for they blasphemed, because the Gentiles were put on a level with them ; they would not have eternal life unless it were bestowed on them on account of some worthiness in themselves — while the Gentiles rejoiced and were glad that forgiveness was ex- tended to them as they were. The apostles did proclaim the gospel in its integrity, but they no where limited salvation to those who believ- ed it. When they said whosoever believeth shall be saved, they declared a truth ; but these words are not the gospel : and when they added he that believetli not shall be damned, it is clear that their meaning was that the gospel would not profit those who believed it not, but the condemnation hanging over them before they heard it would abide upon them. Though our sins are really forgiven, this joyful truth cannot profit us while unbeliered — yet our un- belief cannot make it a lie. " What if some did not believe, shall their unbelief make the faith- fulness of God of none effect ?" It cannot be. If we believe not, he abideth faithful, he can- not deny himself. He hath said and swoin that in Christ all families of the earth shall be blessed — it shall be so. Many of the believing Jews thought that salvation was restricted to those who could count their genealogy from Abraham, and did not see that sinners of the Gentiles could be saved. Genealogies are now no more. There is neither Jew nor Greek. male nor female, common nor unclean, the wall of partition is out of the way — there is one common faith, one common salvation, alike for the/ar off anA the niqh, all being one in Christ Jesus ; so, that which was in part a mystery in other ages, is now made known to all since the day of Pentecost Eph. iii. 5. How can one see God's love to himself, a si»- «er, and not see God's love to aii, eternal life being the gift of God ? An answer to this by any one will be acceptable to April 2Sth. 1851. ANETAZO. Dear Sir — Herewith a few scripture ex- tracts concerning the risen Lord Jesus Acts 10 — 41, are kindly presented to the attention of those Christian brethren and sisters who, at present, think it impossible there can be any intercourse, in the Millennial Resurrection age, between spiritual beings and tiatiiral beings that have not yet passed through death. The appearances of, and intercourse with Jesus after His resurrection. To Mary, as a Gardener. John xx, Z4 To the two Marys. Matt, xxiii — 9, 10. To two disciples, as a Stranger. Luke xxiv, 13. To Peter. Luke xxiv, 34. To the Apostles, (Thomas absent) Luke xxiv, 36. To the eleven, {Thomas present.) John xxiv, 26. To above five hundred, at once. ICor. xv, 6. To all the disciples, on the sea shore, the third time. John xxi, 12,13,14. They all saw Jesus with their natural, bodily eyes, as plainly as before His death : and some of them did talk — eat — and drink with Him. 1 John i. 1, 2 Yours truly, W. S. Sir, — Can any of your readers favour me, and those who take an interest in your magazine, with brief, but authentic memoirs of .Iames Relly, Nathaniel Scarlett, Neil DOUGL A s? Indeed, with memoirs of any, belonging to this country, who during their earthly career were zealous for the cause of God's Universal love ? The lives and actions of men who, in their day, were burning and shining lights of theUni- versalist denomination, most fervently desirous am I to become acquainted with. Others, I doubt not, concur with me in the wish just ex- pressed. I am, Sir, With earnest wishes for the success of your periodical, Yours respectfully D. THOM. Errata in May No. Page 124, line 14 from top, for worse read overt. Page 134, line 4 from top, for threatenings read threatening. Page 134, line 9 from bottom of text, the word sufferings should have been written instead of punishment. 150 REVIEWS. A Few Thoughts suggested hy the perusal of a Tract, entitled, " The Groaning Creation Deiive>-ed." By Paroikos. Brigliton, 1847. Variety in Unity, a TJniversnllaw of Truth. By John Fawcett. Brighton, 1849. — (Procurable through H. K. Lewis,) Many of our readers are well acquainted with the name of Major Fawcett J and all of them have been interested, we should add, edified by those pro- ductions of his which have from time to time appeared in our columns imder the signature of Paroikos. (Stranger) We use the freedom thus unhesitatingly to point to him i righteousness. [The italics ours.] It is in no way inherent, whether the matter be that of the globe we tread upon, or that of which the human body is composed "p. 1?, VOL. n. Y 1.54 REVIEWS. medium of giving the lie to his word, wounded in the house of his professed frieiids. The late celebrated Dr. Chalmers is dragged in by his brother graduate and theologian, as a co-witness with him to the truth of his tlieory. This is a part of his tract in which we conceive our author to be eminently successful. To the chord touched by the minister of St. Paul's, Liverpool, the language quoted from the Scottish preacher vibrates in perfect unison. Neither the appel- lant, nor he to whom the appeal is made, appears ever to have risen by faith above the present. Both are found indulging in dreams which represent the heavenly as a repetition of the earthly ; and which, confounding the divine with the human, by supposing the former to be identical with the latter, Ps. 1. 21,* hold out to Socinians, Neologians, and other fleshly religionists, of a similar description, the prospect of the professedly evangelical, at no distant period, coming to a better understanding with them, than they are now pre- pared to avow. How sweet and captivating, because intelligible by fleshly mind, the pictures drawn by the Scottish and Irish Doctors, of green fields, smiling valleys, bubbling streams, and enchanting landscapes, in that future state which it is the object of their declamation to describe and recommend ! Why should the open Socinian, Pelagian, and Arminian, who are expecting to carry up their nature and virtues with them into the heavenly state, quarrel with men like Dr. Chalmers and Dr. M'Neile, who shew such an amiable solicitude to spare them all this trouble, by bringing down the heavenly state to the level of the earthly 't To Dr. M'Neile, and all other dreamers and enthusiasts like himself, when- ever especially the scriptures are attempted to be brought in by them as con- firmatory of their theory of human natui-e and human life, either as now, or in a somewhat improved form, being restored hereafter, our simple and scrip- tural statement is, " If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature," 2 Cor. v. 17, and " Behold I make all things new." Rev. xxi. 5. That is, Christ died and rose again, not to bring matters back to their former earthly state, or to any thing like it, but to supersede a state that is earthly, by a state that is heavenly. He died, to end the old creation, in ending sin ; he rose again, to establish the new creation, which was effected by his swallowing up of death in victory. Therefore it is, that in making things new, old things of necessity pass away. Isaiah Ixv. 17, 2 Cor. v. 17. ffes/orw/iow of Adam's nature, through Christ .lesus, however great a favourite it may be with ^e«/i/// minded men, has no place in the spiritual vocabulary. Adam having by sin forfeited hu- man nature, Jesus, the second Adam, by righteousness bestows the divine na- ture. 2 Peter i. 4. So far from being able to comprehend the future state, or to map and define it as Dr. M'Neile aff'ects to do, we only know and rejoice in the prospect of possessing it, by that faith which is content to postpone all apprehension of its nature, until we shall be like Christ and see him as he is ; 1 John iii. 2 ; and it is our present total inability to take in the slightest conception of the surpassing and infinite glory of that state, not our ability, with Dr. M'Neile, to restrict and limit it by human apprehensions of its nature, thereby render- ing it attractive to the sceptic and the infidel, that imparts to it such value and importance in our eyes. _ D. T. A Letter to the Rev. Dr. Wiseman, on the Power of the Keys of St. Peter ; shewing that there is no Successor either of the tcrmhius of the Liverpool, Southport, and East Lancashire Kailways. t These are the llev. Mr. Gowring, well known as a writer in the "Gospel Magazine." who ofliciatcd in St. Matthew's about I8;i4 and I8;J5; and the Rev. Robert Townley, B.A. who was Minister during 1844, and the early part of 1.S45, and is now incumbent of the Universalist Ctuireh, Charlestown, Boston, United States. RK VIEWS. 157 preached by its able, learned, and esteemed autlior, in exposition and vindica- tion of the truths asserted in the great Anglican Formulary. Highly and decidedly Calvinistic is this composition of the Doctor's, in its whole strain. Its leading topic is the sovereign and distinguishing love of God to the mem- bers of his Church. "The piuposes of the Godhead, secret to us until they are revealed by the Holy Spirit," it proposes to consider, and does consider, "in a three-fold jjoint of view : his decretive will — his electing love — his pre- destinating grace.'' Clearly, consistently, and powerfully, as might have been anticipated, does Dr. Buck handle his subject. He is no Universalist ; indeed, the decided foe of God's boundless mercy. But, in spite of this, his views are so far scriptural. So far as he goes, we see little or nothing to object to. Some phrases, perhaps, we might have liked altered. But where, upon the whole, the matter is so excellent and unobjectionable, we are not disposed to be hypercritical. Our friend Mr. Figgins, has written with a direct reference to the recent Papal Aggression, The power of the keys entrusted to Peter, Matt. xvi. 18, 19, furnishes him with the groundwork of his discourse. In opening up his subject, he enquires first, "What is this power, and to whom was it commit- ted ? " in answering which, he ably and satisfactorily blows to pieces the doc- trine of " Apostolical Succession," — His answer to the second question, "To whom was the language of the text addressed?" allows a certain priority and pre-eminence exclusively to Peter. Qualified and explained as Mr. Figgins' words under this head are, we see nothing that is positively objectionable in them. On the contrary, we think he establishes his point, Peter certainly did use the keys of the kingdom of Heaven in opening it, first to Jews, Acts ii, and aftervvai'ds to Gentiles, Acts x. Perhaps we should have liked better, if Mr. Figgins, either in the text or in a note, had adverted to that magnificent and most instructive criticism of Granville Penn, on the language of verse 18, oocuring in that eminent man's " Annotations on the Book of the New Covenant," in which he renders it extremely doubtful, if the words, Thou art Peter, were ever uttered by our Lord at all. Y.V siitoc^, thou hast said it, is nearly if not quite as ancient a reading as SJsi YLsTcos, thou art Peter ; and uncial letters, without spaces between the words, and written contracted- ly, produce equally both readings. cTEinc, or 2TEIii2, may, when ex- tended, be either cru liKag, or (Tv ei Herpog—a state of dubiety in which no witchcraft is required to tell us to which side the Church of Rome would lean, and on the propagation of which lection its influence would be brought to bear. Does not cru Intx; directly express the very meaning, which the majority of Protestant interpreters have by a roundabout way sought to establish? — Under the head of Mr. Figgins' reply to his third question, "What is the meaning of the most important words in the passage?' we encounter some most interest- ing and important observations on " keys," " kingdom of Heaven," " binding and loosing,'' 8zc. Altogether, this is a very valuable portion of a very valu- fble sermon. To its able, eloquent, and scripturally-minded author, we return our best thanks, and hope that from the success of this coup d'essai of his, ■ he may be induced soon to venture before the public again. Mr. Figgins, no more than Dr. Buck, makes a profession of Universalism. No matter. We bless God for the measure of truth that has been revealed to him, and desire to profit by his scriptural teaching, to the extent to which it goes. D. T. Speech o/ Henry Drummond, Esq., M.P. «« the House of Comvions, on Thurs- day, March 27, 18.51, on the Second Readincj of the "Ecclesiastical 'Titles Bill." With a Preface and Notes. London : Thomas Bosworth, Regent Street. 1851. A MOST seasonable publication. Public opi-aion requires to be rectified as to what Popery is, and as to its workings and tendencies. Mr. Drummond's speech, which when delivered in the Huu.jc of Commons, and as reported in 158 REVIEWS. the newspapers, was telling enough, now that it comes out with the addition of painful, but most important notes, disclosing a state of things, the re-introduc- tion of which into England every right-minded Protestant has reason to depre- cate, may well excite serious reflection. Popery, however foul and abominable, considered merely as a religion, has a right to the most perfect tolerance. But Popery, under the guise of religion assuming a secular character and aspect, — introducing monasteries and nunneries, invading death-beds, clutching at spoil, and interfering with education and the laws of the realm, — requires on the part of our government and legislature, not merely surveillance, but the exercise of a severe and wholesome control. D. T. Faith and the Evidences; Faith and Miracles: being an Extract from an Unpublished Essay on the Idealism of Christianity. By Peter Hatelv Waddell, Minister of the Gospel, Girvan. London : H. K. Lewis, Gower Street North ; Menzies, Edinburgh ; Gallic, Glasgow. 1851. Few productions indicate more masculine vigour of mind, more power of con- densed thought, and greater ability to go down to the bottom of things, than do those of Mr. Waddell. The pamphlet now lying before us, which purports to be an extract from a larger unpublished work, is eminently calculated to sustain, if not even to advance, the author's previously well-earned reputation. Worthy is it of the writer of " Protestant Delusions," and "The Sojourn of a Sceptic.'' It consists of two chapters. The one is entitled, " Faith and the Evidences ;'* the other, " Faith and Miracles." Both are truly excellent. They almost exhaust the subjects of which they respectively treat. In new, striking, and original views, presented in a new, striking, and original manner, they positi- tively abound. In reading — in acquaintance with many of the more promi- nent characteristics of continental philosophy and theology — in divine teaching imparted through that alone source of what is true, spiritual, and heavenly, tlie Bible — they shew our author to be no mean proficient. As regards acuteness, comprehension, and massive power of intellect, set off and graced by an imagi- nation rich but under strict control, we know few of the present day who are Mr. Waddell's equals, mucli less superiors. We certainly do wish, that, with his other high qualities, our author had combined a little more simplicity, or rather power of simplification. We wish that he fiad shewn a little more deference for the common understandings of mankind. Enlightened and vigorous minds, like his own, will read and appreciate his magnificent treatises. But what of the multitude? Alas! we fear their courage, like their understandings, failing them almost at the outset of their perusal of a work like this. Would that Mr. Waddell could have broken down its contents a little more into fragments, calculated for digestion by the popular intellect. Some, no doubt, will in spite of the difficulties which condensed and profound thought, admittmg of no repose, throw in tlieir way, press on and be ber.efited. Perusal of a tract like this is well fitted to brace up and give tone to the mental energies. But how many will be deteiTcd from making the effort ! As to Mr. Waddell's grand, and upon the whole most truthful divine senti- ments, an acqiuiintance witlr tlie scriptural theory of" Divine Inversion," can alone enable them to be understood and appreciated. D. T. Reasons ivhy Christians believe in the Doctrine of Universal Salvation. Tavi- stock: T. S. Chave. 1850. This is a delightful and most useful manual of Univcrsalist doctrine. A great proportion of it is expressed in the language of inspiration, and therefore carries with it the greatest weight. Under a certain number of heads, as, for instance, "The disbelief of truth does not make it false," " (iod's perfections must harmonize, or he is not God,'' " Evil," "The will of (iod and the will of man,'' "The will ot God is love," " God will overcome evil with good,'' &c. REVIEWS. 159 quotations from God's word, and from tlie works of writers on the universality and infinitude of God's love are set down. We find, likewise, towards the end of the tract, a careful selection of " Questions,'' such as, "Has God power over all men ? Shall man's unbelief frustrate the purposes of God ? Can God change ?" &c. &c. all " answered by the word of God." The whole being fol- lowed up by a series of reasons, " Why we believe Christ is God manifest in the flesh." The pamphlet closes with a brief, but most pointed poetical view or abstract 1, of Arminianism, 2, of Calvinism, and 3, of Universalism. Altogether, we know few tracts better fitted than this to be put into the hands of persons enquiring as to the extent of God's love, who have hitherto been ignorant even of the elements of the subject, and who cannot command time for a minute and protracted investigation. And this, because to God's word alone it points, as having authority to decide in the matter. Useful likewise, it may be even to those who contemplate carrying out their researches farther. D. T. Farewell Address to the Church Assemhling at the late Countess of Huntingdoris Chapel, North Street, Brighton ; with the Correspoiulence that has passed between the Minister of the said Chapel, and one of the late Committee of Managers. (Henry James Esq, Lieut. R.N.) London : C. M. Firth, 1846. These ably written letters of Mr. James, breathing throughout the spirit of manly independence, combined with Christian and benevolent feeling, we have long intended to notice. It is of no consequence that they have been for some years before the public. A good thing does not lose by being kept. Pain- fully interesting are the facts which the pamphlet now before us discloses. Mr. James, author of the " Address,'' &c. and Mrs. James, had, it appears, for a long period of time been members of the late Countess of Huntingdon's connexion, and were in full communion with the Society assembling for wor- ship in Brighton, under the ministry of the Rev. Joseph Sortain. A convic- tion of the love of God to man extending farther than to the Church, or first fruits of the spiritual harvest, having been introduced into their minds, they, particularly Mrs. James who was active and zealous in every good work, seem honestly to have brought the fact under the notice of their Pastor. Books on the subject of Uiiiversiil Salvation were left by them for his perusal. At first, it looks as if Mr. Sortain wished to cax-ry himself gently with them. He pro- bably did not like to come to a rupture, and part with, two such excellent and respectable members of his body. Nay, he seems at one time even to have gone so far, when conversing with Mrs. James on the subject of punishment, as to have said : " I do not myself believe in the eternity of punishment; but it will not do to preach this.'' p. 34.* But after a while, for what reason does not appear, Mr. Sortain saw meet to change his tactics. Mr. James was, first of all, by his orders, prevented addressing a missionary prayer meeting; and was subsequently deprived of his oflSce as a member of the Committee of Management, as well as, with Mrs. James, debarred from the Lord's table. With some other acts of petty spite, and ecclesiastical overbearing, the afore- named Pastor, aided by his wife, seems to have rendered himself chargeable. Eager did this gentleman shew iiimself, as many of his class have done, by the exercise of severity towai'ds those professing to believe that " the living God is the Saviour of all men,'' to guard himself against the imputation of favour- ing a doctrine which, whatever may be its divine claims to regard, is unfashion- able and unpopular. The conduct of Mr. Sortain gave rise to the publication of the " Address,'' and " Correspondence" now lying before us. Well worthy is the whole of a careful and attentive perusal — especially the long letter bearing date 29th Nov. 1845. Seldom have we met with a more * Respecting how many more of fhe soi-disiatii orthodox, have reports of similar language having been used been brought to our ears. 100 REVIEAVS, powerful and telling application of the argnineiiluvi ad hominem. Mr. Sorlain's own language contained in a then recent publication of his, in favour of the right of private judgment and personal liberty of conscience, is quoted against himself with most damaging effect. But more ; while the precipitancy and arbitrariness of his conduct are exposed, some of the grand and most precious declarations of God's word, respecting the universality of man's redemption and'salvation, are admirably brought in and enforced.* What above all things we rejoice to observe is, that Mr. James's language, although pointed and spirited, is uniformly gentlemanlike, and stamped with the impress of Christian feeling and principle. Speaking of a charge brought by Mr. Sortain against Mr. James, of his sys- tem subverting man's moral responsibility, the latter gentleman says : " with respect to my holding views which destroy, as you are pleased to assert, man's moral responsibility, I deny the fact. Hitherto, you have contented yourself with the mei-e assertion that I do so ; it is sufficient for me to oppose, as I stedfastly do, my statement to yours. I hold man now, and ever from the first, responsible to God who made lum, as a creature to his Creator — as a crea- ture, I say possessing intelligence and affections. Man manifested dislike to the declared will of God, and opposition to it ; in this he was morally wrong ; and such mankind have proved themselves to be, as mere natural men, from Adam downwards to the present day. They are morally wrong; they have naturally conscience, more or less enlightened, of being wi"ong; they are morally responsible ; and moreover, they are dealt with by tlie Lord, according to such their inalienable responsibility. The wages of sin is death, the punish- ment of death ; death reigns by sin, Rom. v. and some moreover who do not partake of the lirst resurrection. Rev. xx. G, the resurrection of the Just, un- dergo after their resurrection at a later period a second death in the lake of fire, according to their desert. But still God's gracious purpose in Christ Jesus includes them, and touches tliem all : Death, the last enemy, shall be destroyed ; God shall be all in all. 1 Cor. xv. Surely, it is too much to be told, and, moreover, to be summarily dealt with, according to such declarations unsupported by Scripture proof, that the views which I hold destroy man's moral responsibility. I challenge you distinctly to make good your assertion on Scripture grounds, or else to retract the same." P. 21. Another quotation we cannot resist the pleasure of making. It has respect to the word of God as tlie sole court of appeal in religious controversies : — "When this has been done, another assertion you have also ventured to make in the same communication of yours of October 15, may be allowed to carry some weight. I quote your own words to Mrs. James, written in vindication of yourself. ' I feel sure, however, that your own good feeling will tell yoii, that no such consideration should weigh against what I, what all the ministers by whom you have heen tauglit — what tlie Church Catholic considers vital truth.' Certainly, as a question of fact, I may venture to disallow, as I do, that such doctrine as I hold, has been considered by the Church Catholic to be opposed to vital truth. This canncjt be shewn; but even if it coidd, the appeal still lies to the word of God. To Him we are debtors, and not unto man ; and though it is true, (notwithstanding the sweeping assertion in which you have indulged), that many have held, and that many still hold such doc- trines as those wherein I rejoice, and am thankful to my Heavenly Father, I forbear to bespeak from their case any patronage of my views ; and content myself, as in duty bound, with enquiring both of you and of others who may condenni me for my tenets, ' What saith the Scriptiue ?' " To our friends we say, read and circulate this excellent pamphlet. In some respects, we may differ from the respected author. Nevertiieless, the truths for which he contends, and for avowing which ho has suflered, are too valuable, and the manner in which he maintains them is on the whole too scriptural, to permit us at present to advert to either minute or more important discrepan- PIPS. iJ- 1. THE UNIYEHSALIST. JULY, 1851. THE HELL OF CHRISTENDOM AND THE HELL OF HEATHENDOM IDENTIFIED, AND COMPARED WITH THE HELL OF SCRIPTURE. [concluded.] After quoting several passages, in which he thinks it " probable " that future punishment is taught in the Old Testament Scriptures, Professor Stuart * observes, — " The probability that Sheol designates the future punishment of the vi^icked, in the passage just cited, depends, perhaps, in a great measure, on the state of knowledge among the Hebrews with regard to future rewards and punishments. I am well aware, as I have already hinted above, that there are critics who maintain that the Hebrews had no knowledge or belief of any such doctrine. But as it is now past all doubt, that the ancient Egyptians (of Moses' time) did believe and teach very expressly the doctrine in question, I am not able to comprehend how Moses, " who was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians,'' should have been ignorant of this doctrine. Nor, as I have already said, can I be persuaded without strong, nay, irrefragable evidence, that the people of God, among whom were patriarchs and prophets, knew less respecting a future state of rewards and punish- ments, than their heathen neighbours wlio were wholly destitute of any special revelations." Is not this a remarkable passage in the work of the most eminent living defender of the orthodox hell ? The Egyptians believed in future punishments — Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians — therefore the Hebrews must have believed in future punishment. The Egyptians believed that the soul of man was punished by transmigra- tion into a pig — Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians — therefore the Hebrews believed in transmigration. f The learned Professor, backed though he be by Doctor Samuel Davidson — must excuse us if we decline placing any reliance upon such an argument (although the Hebrews should appear more ignorant than their heathen neighbours) as that God's ancient people held the doctrine of the soul's immortality and future punishment, because it was embodied in the wis- dom of the Egyptians, until it can be shewn that their wisdom was from above. We believe in the authority of Moses, and are content to follow the inspired account of the matter as recorded by his pen. We pre- sume, with Professor Stuart, that as Moses was acquainted with the * Exegetical; Essays on Several Words relating to Future Punishment, loith a Recommendatory Preface by Samuel Davidson, LL.D. Edinburgh, 1842. p. 88. i And BO the sect of the Pharisee! did in our Lord's time, as we learn from Josephus. VOL, II. Z 162 THE IIEI.I, OF rilRISTKNDOM, StC, philosophy of the ancient Egyptians, he conld not have been ignorant of their doctrine respecting man's future existence and condition. But, instead of countenancing the idea that Moses believed their notions to be true, we find in his silence respecting them in his five books, most satisfactory evidence that they were false. From Moses is handed down to us the account of the creation of man ; but from that account we have no more authority to assume the immortality of the soul, than we have the immortality of the body.* Moses has recorded God's threat- ened punishments, and many of the punishments which were inflicted for the sins of men ; yet we do not read of their infliction upon the immortal soul beyond the grave, much less of their endless duration. Moses was the medium of communication to man of God's laws, yet he is silent as the grave respecting the " world of woe '' being the penalty of transgression. But " he that despised Moses' law died without mercy" (by stoning) "under two or three witnesses," and "every transgression received a just recompense of reward." Heb. ii. 2. Now " Moses verily was faithful in all his house.'' (Heb. iii. 5). But if man has an immortal soul to save, and a world of woe to escape, Paul has made a mistake in characterising him as faithful — the conduct of Moses is utterly inexplicable, and our " faithful preachers " are showing us wherein Moses was deficient ; for no declamation such as we now hear proceeded from his lips, nor from any who were sent to denounce God's judgments upon the sinful and impenitent. " The immortality of the soul " is neither the language nor the doc- trine of Scripture. Even amongst the heathen, those who taught it admitted that their best arguments failed to yield them satisfaction.-}- Such is the glinnnering and flickering light of nature ! Only the light of divine revelation could disclose the truth respecting man and his destiny, and this light we have : life and immortality are brought to light by the gospel — by the glad tidings which were first made known to man after he had sinned. Indeed until man had sinned, upon him immor- tality could not be conferred, and to him it could not be revealed. Mortality is swallowed up of life, and corruption puts on incorruption, not by the perpetuation of the mortal and the corruptible — but by their supercession by the immortal and the incorruptible : not by creation (we are not created immortal souls) but by new-creation. "There is no snch thing as human immortality, although human beings by possession of the blessings of the gospel, become partakers of immortality. As descendants of Adam we are not immortal, for in Adam we all die ; and there is as much ground in reason for the pre-existence of the" soul to man's birth, as there is for its continued existence after his death. The gospel claims the absolute and sole right of discovering to us immor- ttality which heathenizing Christians not only assume to be discoverable independently of Revelation, but assume for that nature which Revela- tion declares to be dying, perishing, and corruptible. J ■* Immortality is an nttributr of the dirino nnfure, the nature which cannot sin. If, therefore, because man is said to be made in the divine image, he must he considered immortal, not less rertainlv, must 1\<> be considered sin/c.ss e seas and all that is therein, and thou preservest them all.' Now do you not understand from this passage that lUeraUy, all things, inclusive of men, and of all men, were created by God, and are under his providential superintendence and care 1—E. D. Cer- tainly I do. — U. And I presume tlie principle of interpretation, upon which you judge this to be the meaning of the passage, is no other than that of taking the words used, and, especially, the word ' all,' — the only one in the passage by which such Universality is expressed, or caji be supposed to be ex- pressed, — in their natu-^al sense, their plain and obvious meaning? — E. D. Exactly so. — U. Now, if any one were to say that he excluded those who are called the ' children of the devil ' from the ' all things ' spoken of in this pas- sage, in consequence of a belief that the devil was their Creator and not God, would 3'ou not think that he was taking a most unwarrantable li;)erty with Scripture in thus limiting tlie word 'all,' for no other reason in the world than to prevent its clashing with this particular opinion of his, as tj the extent of creation bv God ? — E. D. No doubt I should." " U. V/ell, but according to your own admission, you have na better reason yourself for limiting this same word ' all,' and the expressions ' every,' 'the world,' ' the whole world,' when salvation is spoken of. Is it not for the self- same reason that you do so, viz. to prevent their clashing with your particular opinion, merely substituting the extent q{ salvation for th&toi creation I — E.D. I cannot deny that it is. — U. Then you must either consider that every one is at liberty to mould the meaning of scripture to his particular opinions, or that for some reason or otiier, yon are at liberty to do so while others are not. You admit, it appears, that all are not. You must, therefore, consider yourself to enjoy some special privilege in this matter. Is it that you consider yourself to be infallible in your opinions upon religious subjects? — E. D. Of course, I do not consider myself to be naturally infallible, but I do believe this, that I am under the Spirit's teaching with regard to the extent of salvation, and, there- fore, infallible in my o])inion upon that point. — U. But do you not think there are many of God'a regenerated children, thinking differently from you on cer- tain points of doctrine, who believe themselves to be under the Spirit's teaching with regard tliereto, whom you, however, believe to be in error both as to the supposed fact of being under the Spirit's teaching on such points, and also as to their particular o])inions thereupon ? — E. D. I certainly do. — U. Then what grounds have you for settling it as quite out of the question, that you may be in error upon the particular point we are dis- cussing, (the extent of solvation,) and also in thinking that you are under the S|)irit's teaching with regard thereto? — E.D. I admit the ditiiculty this ques- tion places me in ; l)ut, my good friend, if I believe that only some are to be saved, what am 1 to do wiili those passages, in which the words we are dis- cussing arc used with reference to salvaiion ? — C^. lleully I think your own question places you in a far nmic a>vk\vnrd posiiioii than mine docs; if 7/o« MAX AND LAW, 183 hellfve that oulfi soma are to be saved, what are you to do with those passages in the word of (rod, wliich declare, in language as plain as any that coulJ be used, that all are to be saved? I admit the dilHculty of having to con- tend with such passages as these, nor do I know of an}' way of getting rid of it so effectual as cutting them at once out of the Bible." " E. D. A truce to irony : you are aware that my opinion is founded upon what I believe to be the truth of the Bible. — U. Well, but what passages in the Bible are we to found our opinion upm as to who shall be saved, if not upon those wliicli are most simply and distinctly declaratory upon tliis very point V &c. &c. pp. 15, 16. There are a few things to which we might object in Mr. Bond's theory : such, for instance, as the nature of the judgment which he anticipates being pro- nounced at Christ's second coming. But where the sentiments are not only, on the whole, so coincident with our own, but what is of infinitely more impor- tance, so thoroughly scriptural, we cannot find it in our heart to have recourse to what might have even the appearance of carping and cavilling. We must now bring this hasty notice to a close ; and we do so by observing, that one reading, nay, two or three readings of this most valuable pamphlet, will scarcely suffice for the reader to do himself and tlie author justice. It may be fitly perused many times, and at each successive perusal with increasing advantage. And however dry and repulsive it may b& felt to be at first — however fatignin']; its demands on our reflective energies — an increased ac- quaintance with it, and with those Scriptures to which it incessantly appeals, will be found to bring out beauties in it of which we were not previously aware, and to inspire us witli an interest in it which we had not previously experienced. Divine truth will, by means of it as an index pointing to the only source of such truth, become in our eyes incieasingly glorious. In a word, this is one of the very few controversial treatises on the subject of religion, perused by us in tlie course of a somewhat prolonged literary life, concerning which we can honestly declare with reference to the integrity no less than skill with which its discussions are conducted, to its scriptural character, and to the exceedingly suggestive nature of its contents, that decies repetita placebit et juvabit* D. T. "MAN AND LAW." " I am satisfied that the nature of every being constitutes the law of that being ; in other words, constitutes the authority to which the being is in all its powers, faculties, and propensities, subject. Proceeding upon this principle, as the nature of the cat and that of the dog constitute the laws to which these animals respectively are subject, so does the fleshly nature of man constitute the law to which he naturally and necessarily, both as to body and mind, is subject likewise. Indeed, the principle is of such universal application, that, with the exception of God alone — in whom his nature is subject to his will, that is, is subject to himself — the nature of every being constitutes the law, the only law, to which properly speaking that being is subject, and whic!> it obeyst. — But to return. Adam's body was first created, and then his mind, as we Jearn from Gen. ii. 7; and the same progress, from the previous existence of body to that of mind, takes place, as we know, in all his descendants. That is, man was originally of the earth, earthy ; or had first imparted to him a body composed of earthly materials, with which a mind suitable to its earthly nature was afterwards associated. The mind was thus, by its very creation , made to depend on the body ; and man owed an allegiance to the law of flesh, or to the constitution of his fleshly nature, before by any possibility he could owe an * Mr. Bond's smaller tract, entitled, " Universalism, or the Eventual Blessedness in Christ of all Mankind, the Doctrine of the Bible," &c. London, H. K. Lewis, 1850, deserves, at least, a passing notice. Its proofs of •' the Nature of the first Communication to Abraham," its " Appeal to Candour," its " Answers to Objections," and its "Questions proposed to High Calvinists," are all, in their several ways, most excellent. They each and all indicate a master's hand. 'What can be better than the following morceati, extracted from the " Questions;" — " Does not Univer- salim set at nought the atonement? "i^es, certainly: \( extending x\\e Aeiign and result thereof to all mankind, instead oi limiting them to a few, is setting it at nought ; but not othenvise." t L" Divine Inversion," pp. 32— 8i5.J 184 CORRESPONDENCE. allegiunce to any other law. Flesh is man's lawgiver and rightful monarch ; and, from the law of flesh, he can by no efforts of his own— no means of his own devising and executing — withdraw himself. To a being thus situated, that is, thus previously owing allegiance to the law of flesh as the law of his nature, one law of God, in the shape of the prohibition imposed on Adam, was addressed. And this not to render our natual progenitor subject to divine law, or to evince his capability of ever becoming so ; but to make manifest the utter impossibility of his nature ever being subjected to divine law, in consequence of its having been previously subjected, and of the allegiance which therefore it owed to the law of flesh. Of this, the one transgression of Adam afforded ample and suffi- cient evidence. It shewed that his mind, as fleshly, was not sub]bct to God's law ; neither, indeed, was able to he so. That as fleshly, its very nature con- stituted a law of sin and death : requiring, merely, the imposition on it of a divine prohibition, in order to bring out and display what it actually was.'' — Tkoin-s Dialogues on Universal Salvation. CORRESPONDENCE. ^To (he Editor of " The Universalist." Sir, — The author of " An Analytical Arrangement of the Holy Scriptures," recently published, will be much obliged by your inserting the following sub- stituted correction in your forthcoming number* R. B. R. Vol. II. page 488, line 26, after '■'■ tauyht false doctrines" — read as follows- Doctor Bloomfield also should not have ignored Mr. Farmer's work on this subject (a work which convinced Primate Newcome,) particularly the follow- ing passage, which shows that " the reality of possessions could not be directly and immediately determined by the authority of Christ and his apostles without great impropriety. "For the miracles performed upon the demoniacs were designed for the con- viction of unbelieoers ; they were the means used to bring them over to the faith; and consequently tlieir nature was to be judged of and determined by the test of reason alone, before men believed that is, before men could admit the authority of their performers, or pay any deference to their judgment. And therefore, if you say that Christ or his apostles interposed their authority to decide the present question, you not only affirm what cannot be proved, but you reproach these divine instructors with a conduct unbecoming and absurd ; you make them urge their authority in a case to which it could not extend, and upon persons by whom it was not yet acknowledged, who ought to be left (and who accordingly were left) to judge or themselves, as the cir- cumstances of the case itself might seem to require. What St. Paul says concerning the gift of tongues is equally true with respect to the cure of demoniacs: it is /or a sign, not to them/^ai believe, but for them that believe not," — Farmer on Demoniacs, p. 221, 222 ; 2nd. Edit. See also Dr. Arnold's remarks to the same purpose, given in the note on Heb. i. I omit to notice other matter in the Doctor's note, which must stand or fall with that now considered. To the Editor of " The Universalist." Dear Sin, — In No. 18 (for June last; there appears a reply by " Anetazo" to the writers of two letters in Nos. 15 and 16 {for March and April of this Magazine). As he continues to con- found statements which we endeavour to point out were essentially different, puts forward his own deductions and conclusions were express Scriptural declarations are demanded, takes little or no notice of arguments directed towards the nature and reasons of the difference between us, and assumes as undoubted things which we either doubt or deny, we see no propriety in further occupying your space wiih the controver.sy. \Vc would only refer the reader to the careful perusal of the correspondence already published, and also to the article in No. 17 (for May) en- titled "The Apostolic Gospel and Universallsm," the authorship of which we are at present in ignorance of, but which we are glad to find so aljly supports us in our opposition to the views of •' Anetazo." Again thanking you for the opportunity you have given him of expressing his sentiments on a point wliicli he considers of no small importance, the writer remains, Yours veiv sincerely, KKDIKALETHES. THE UNIVERSALIST, AUGUST, 1851. PEACE ON EARTH. Whatever may be the fortunes or misfortunes of Peace Societies, and Peace Congresses, we cannot but heartily commend the Christian and benevolent spirit by which they are called into existence ; and though no more be accomplished by them than a protest against the principle and practice of war, such protest is as honourable to those who make it, as it is condemnatory of those who delight in war, nor can it be without salutary influence upon the minds of men. How naturally has human glory come to be associated with the battle field and victory ! Glory urges the warrior to the fight, and stimulates his thirst for blood, and nerves his arm for resistance to the death. Glory ! and at the sound, from the domestic circle he hurries forth whose ambition lures him to face the foe! He whose cup of joy Avas filled from affection's fount and whose happiness flowed from sources of good will and neighbourhood with those around his smiling home- stead, shuts and steels his heart's sensibilities against all the gentle and peaceful influences of his seclusion, and pants to be a conqueror, and will die for glory ! Contrast this with the fact involved in the angel's song — " peace on earth." Glory is by man associated with war ; the glory of God is bound up with peace — "glory to God in the high- est, on earth peace." Military glory is acquired through uncompromi- sing determination to trample down and crush a foe. The glory of God is achieved by the humiliation and submission of him by whom all the glory of the world (" he is our peace ") is secured. The glory of the one is war, of the other, peace ; the one is effected by hate, the other by love. The pastoral life is eminently suggestive of tranquillity and repose. To shepherds watching over their flocks, amid the stillness and serenity of night, was the announcement of peace most appropriately made. What a contrast does this shepherd's field present to the field of battle ! The one is honourable and useful ; the other pernicious and destructive. A king for some imaginary insult, it may be, summons his armies — his glory must not be compromised — and presently his revenge is gratified by the sacrifice of the flower of manhood and the cry of the widow and the fatherless. Something more than an imaginary insult demands the execution of justice at the hands of the King of kings — ^his glory he will not give to another — his glory is maintained, and peace on earth is secured. We rely with unwavering confidence on the realization of a prospect 2 D 186 PEACE ON EARTH. SO delightful : nor would we damp the zeal of any peace advocate by suggesting that the peace he is pursuing may be but a phantom. We look upon the annunciation to the shepherds, as not only an expression of "good will to man" but as a prophecy, with the accomplishment of which is interwoven " the glory of God." We are, however, compelled, by respect for the authority of Scripture, to draw attention to certain things which belong to the peace which Christ came to accomplish, as essential to its realization and consummation as a matter of fact. " I came not to send peace on earth, but a sword," says the Saviour. " What a contradiction !" exclaims the sceptic ; and yet it is perfectly consistent and philosophical. " Whence come wars ?" asks an apostle ; and the reply is " Of your own lust for war." And so from Cain, the first murderer, to the present time, has been most fearfully and con- stantly developed the truth attested by Scripture and experience, re- specting human nature, that its essential characteristic is — " hateful and hating one another."* Peter iii. 3. The sword is the precursor of peace, as light is of day — as chaos is of order. Progress involves contro- versy. The agitated waters become pure. We may dam up a running stream, but by and by the waters overflow, our barrier is washed away and it rushes onward with increased impetuosity. The enemy may be cowered, his hostilities may be laid aside, he may seem to be a friend, but a favourable opportunity presents itself, the mask is withdrawn, and we are surprised into a deadly conflict. Peace on earth, it is true, is the ultimate end of the advent of the Prince of peace, but in order to its realization and enjoyment, there must be conflict, strife, destruction, victory. This is absolutely necessary. The fact that human nature is diametrically opposed to the divine nature (Rom. viii. 7), is the proof. Compromise, even if it were possible, might purchase the semblance of peace — real harmony would be unattained. But with the Almighty there is no such thing as compromise ; with Him is no variableness or shadow of turning. Hence, he girds his sword upon his thigh, and rides forth, conquering and to conquer. Our Lord, in finishing the work which his Father gave him to do, knew how to sympathize with his servant Paul, when he said, " I have fought a good fight ;'' for not until he had exhausted the strength of the last enemy, did he lay down the sword. Sin was vanquished, and the nature that had sinned was sacrificed : over death and hades he completely triumphed. And thus was the way opened for substantial and abiding peace. As it was with our Lord so must it also be with his servants. The sword must not be returned to its scabbard till the enemy be vanquished. The heart of every Christian, indeed, is the arena of the same conflict which is to be carried on in the world. Here is a microcosm wherein the powers and principalities, the spirit and the flesh, the heaven-born and the hell-born, do strive with restless hostility. The Church militant carries on the struggle. But let us not confound the Church militant with man's militant Church which is ever being agitated and divided by internal strife. The members of the true Church militant strive, not against each other, but *' together, for the faith and hope of the gos- • Let those who think this a libel on human nature, recall some old private friend- ships, and think what has become of them when self-interest has been thwarted, &c. PEACE ON EARTH. 187 pel." Not within the Church do they draw the sword, but they go after the Captain of their salvation, " without the camp, bearing his re- proach." We are thorough believers in " the perseverence'' and final triumph '* of the saints." Hostilities have never ceased, nor has a tem- porary truce ever lulled the battle into a momentary calm. The strife waxes hotter, and will yet increase : nor until He, whose right it is to reign, shall have made the kingdoms of this world the kingdom of our God and of his Christ will the strugsfle be over. But the crisis is past (John xii. 31) ; the battle is the Lord's ; the shout of victory antici- pated will be echoed by the shout of victory achieved : the last enemy will have fallen, and " then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written. Death is swallowed up in victory.'' And then there shall be war no more, but peace shall flow as a river. Jesus is the conqueror : sin and death are fallen foes. But our weapons, though mighty, are not carnal. Hatred in man to God, is opposed by love in God to man ; and before the omnipotence of him who humbled himself even to the death of the cross, every high thing that exalteth itself is brought into willing captivity to the obedience of Christ. Man's hate, man's enmity is slain. Man, created anew, shall be at peace with himself, because at peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Self-interest will not be extinguished, but promoted in the sympathy he will cherish with the divine purpose and the identifica- tion of his own well-being with the blessedness of universal man. Per- fect harmony will reign where the dissonance and discord of sin only was manifest. But the end is not yet : we see not yet all things put under him. But who doubts the glorious consummation of Christian hope ? This world, it is true, upon whose projects (even its schemes of bene- volence and goodness) so much effort is bestowed, is found " A broken reed at best, but oft a spear, On its sharp point peace bleeds, and hope expires." But omnipotence is pledged to accomplish the promise made, and solemnly ratified, and sacredly confirmed, — the promise which was solace to the first sinner, which rejoiced our father Abraham, was the burden of prophecy and of the song of angels, and made old Simeon say, "Lord, now lettest thou Thy servant depart in peace.'' And is there nothing in all this to stimulate the zeal and warm the hearts of those who, after the Christian model, advocate peace on earth ? Is there not something which imparts assurance to their hopes and reality to that which unbelief would suggest is little better than a pleas- ing dream ? Is not their argument strengthened by the consideration that universal peace is involved in the fulfilled purposes of God ? And is not the thought that we are all hereafter to live in holy brotherhood — being the children of God — a reason and a motive for beating swords into plough-shares and spears into pruning-hooks here ? If there be no end to sin there is no end to enmity, and if there be no end to enmity, universal peace is a mere chimera. But we are not dreamers. As believers in God's revealed purpose we devoutly and joyfully an- ticipate the annihilation of sin, and with it the advent of abiding, per- fect peace. 188 THE EXPERIENCE OF A MIND IN SEARCH AFTER TRUTH. Dear Sir, — It has occurred to my mind that a plain and brief statement of some portion of the history or experience of a mind in a search after truth, during the past 13 years, may not be uninteresting or unprofitable to some of your readers. Tlie majority of persons whose minds are directed to the subject of religion adopt, from education or some other reason, the creed and formula of some one of the denominations or sects, and live and die in a profession of that creed, with little, if any, examination whether it be truth or error, indeed with many their own creed is the standard of truth ; anotlier class are tossed about with every wind of doctrine, and ultimately abandon all profession and become sceptics ; whilst a third class, renouncing all creeds, as inconsistent with the scripture and with the nature and tendency of divine truth to lead the mind onward from one developement of the divine character to anotlier, launch on the ocean of truth, daily seeking the wisdom which is from above to lead them into all the truth as it is in Jesus, independent of all human teaching and worldly wisdom, being taught that the foolishness of God is wiser than men and the weakness of God is stronger than men, and depending upon his gracious promise that all his children shall be taught of himself. The latter class have a struggle and conflict to pass through which no language can describe. Dis- covering, the further they advance in the knowledge of God, that tliere is still an immeasurable and unfathomable height, depth, breadth, and length unex- plored, and into which they cannot penetrate but as they are led gradually by the heavenly teacher, and finding at every step the enmity and opposition of their earthly nature to all that is divine and spiritual, they feel that strait is the gate and narrow the way that leadeth unto life. I was born and brought up a member of a Baptist family, professing what are called High Calvinist doctrines, and at the somewhat early age of 20, my mind was quickened into divine life, and my attention powerfully awakened to spiritual things. I had a long experience of the fear which hath torment, and laboured hard, by day and night, by reading, by hearing, and by pi-ayers, to obtain life and peace ; and, as much of my reading and hearing (as I now see) was more calculated to rivet the chains of my bondage than to lead me into the liberty of the gospel, I was kept in a fluctuating state between hope and despair; sometimes in peace and joy, but more frequently in darkness and distress. The conflict and distress of mind I passed through cannot be expressed : those who have been in the same furnace well know its heat and its effect. Early in my spiritual life, there arose in the congregation to which I belonged, a fierce strife between two parties, respectively Arminian and Calvinistic. I took a lively interest in the subject, and had a strong leaning to the Arminian side, and for a long period I devoted hours [o{ the night to the study of the word of God upon those points, with a desire to establish my mind in the Arminian doctrines, but the result was my settled conviction that the doctrine of the Scriptures was absolute, sovereign, unconditional salvation for man by the Son of God, either for the elect Church only, or for all. But not then seeing how salvation could be both special and general, I became a member of the strictest sect of Calvinistic Baptists. After some years com- munion with them, I came gradually to the conviction that their system and manner of preaching was too limited and confined : they alone had the truth and the whole truth, all else were in darkness, and under ttie profession of the deepest humility and self abhorrence there was the grossest pride and Phari- seeisni. After in vain attempting to bring about a change in their piinciples and practice, I left them and joined another society of Baptists, professing the same doctrines, but, as I thought, free from that bitter and exclusive spirit, but alas! I could get no settled rest. I found there a profession of the doctrines, but a ministry in general either opposed to or inconsistent with them. THE FREE CHURCH, ETC. 193 At various periods itiy miiul was much exercised upon the subject of eternal toi ments for the unregeuerate, which I could not reconcile with an unconditional salvation, and upon the various systems, of annihilation and otherwise, pro- posed in opposition to that doctrine ; but I was unable to reconcile them with the scriptures of truth, and although I could not understand many portions of the Word except upon the principle of eternal torments, I found thai opposed to my views of the revealed character of God, and thus was kept in a painful state of doubt and uncertainty. The letter of John Foster, in one of the early numbers of your Magazine, exactly describes the state of my mind at this time. At length I met with a friend professing the principles of Evangelical Uni- versalism, and first heard from him of a system which reconciled the difficulties I had been contending with, by showing a present and manifested salvation of the election of grace, in harmony with the doctrines I had previously believed, and the ultimate salvation of the entire race of man by the destruction of the earthly nature and gift of a new and divine nature, when sin, and death, and hell, shall be destroyed and God shall be all in all. It is not necessary, nor can I intrude so much upon your pages, to explain by what means I have arrived at this stage of divine knowledge, sufiice it to say, that from the scrip- tures alone do I derive my confidence in the truth, and that although I cannot pretend to explain every passage in consistency with this view, I find no diffi- culty in reconciling it with the general principles of Scripture, and with all that is revealed of the character of the unsearchable One, who is declared to be the Saviour of all men, specially of them that believe, and who has given in his word numerous revelations of his gracious purpose to create all things new, and to destroy death and him that hath the power of death, that is, the devil ; who has revealed his name as the Lord God, merciful and gracious, keeping mercy for thousands and forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin, and who has in his Son made an end of sin and brought in everlasting righteousness, and will deliver every creature, now groaning and travailing in pain, from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. Finding many things still in the word of God dark and mysterious, but desiring to bow my mind in submission to all that is there declared, I count not that I have already attained or am already perfect, but press forward after greater manifestations of the knowledge of him who is " Love." Your's trul)', A SEEKER. THE FREE CHURCH AND ALL OTHER PROFESSING CHRISTIAN CHURCHES. We can scarcely afford our readers a higher treat, than by the insertion of the following article, from the pen of that accomplished writer, Thomas Mulock, Esq., which appears in the '• Northern Ensign,'' of July 3rd. Mr. Mulock is not a Universalist; and to some of his statements, especially those regarding the nature, and near approach of the conversion of the Jews, we decidedly demur. But with the exception of what occurs towards the latter portion of the paper, and of two or or three things besides, the spirit and the language of the whole is at once so scriptural and Evangelical — the views are so beautiful and so beautifully expressed — that we cannot prevail upon ourselves to withhold from our readers, the gratificatien which has been afforded to ourselves. D. T. One of tlie richest blessings which the God of all grace is about toshower down upon his church and people, is the clear scriptural knowledge of the use, scope and operation of the law of Moses, as spiritually shone upon by the Sun of everlasting righteousness — even Christ the Lord and King of Glory, Whilst it is an immutable truth, that all believers in the Son of God are dead unto the law, and delivered from the law, — Rom. vii. 4, 6. — yet it is equally true, that so long as the sun and moon shall endure, Christ's glory in magnifyinq the law and mahing it honourable will shine forth in the holy acknowledgments of his righteous and ransomed people. The law served as a schoolmaster to bring 2 E 190 THE FREE CHURCH, ETC. iinto CJirlxf, but whonfoith is co7ne, so as to supersede the rigorous rule of tlie schoolmaster, still the instruction authoritatively imparted remains indelibly and blessedly engraven on the minds of God's enfranchised children. The law was a shadow of good things to come, and, as such, is worthy of eternal thanksgiving and praise ; for in the law is foreshewn the sufferings and glory of the Lord Jesus. Luke xxiv. 44. The more, therefore, we discern of the pre- eminent perfection of the new coveiiant the more we shall have our understand- ings opened to behold the typical excellency of the Old Testament. The special meaning, particular purport. Divine design, and holy prefiguration of all tlie Levitical ordinances, will be interpreted to us by the Holy Spirit, whilst leading believers into s.icred fellowship with Christ. All priesthood, all sacri- fices, all tithes and offerings, under the law, will be spiritually resolved into new covenant worship of the Son of God ; and for this all-sufficient reason, that Christ is the end of the low for r?ghteo?isness to every one that helieveth. Thus, too, all the blessings of the fulfilled law will become manifestly the por- tion of believers, as being one \vith''Christ, and therefore fully entitled to claim all the benefits flowing from his perfect obedience. In the frequent repitition of the solemn sanctions of the law, we always find that the complete fulfilment of God's holy commandments is invariably insisted on. Tiie eternal God demands present, perfect, and unswerving submission to his most righteous will ; and guiltiness in one point is declared to be guiltiness in all. Every man who knows God's law is a debtor to do the ivhole law ; and in failure of entire obedience, becomes liable to the destroying penalties of God s curse. Dent, xxviii. I,'). Looking nakedly at the Decalogue, it is plain that every human being whom it reaches must either instantly perish or be consumed ivilh dying ; for man has no natural power, in his fallen state, of com- plying with any commandment of God. The creature is all evil, body and soul, and consequently no righteous requisition can ever control or induce him to obedience. Why, then, it may be asked, was a law given with the full foreknowledge of a total incapacity on the part of man to fulfil it, or even any part of it — for univei'sal obedience is inexorably and rightfully exacted? To which we reply in the Apostle's words, Wherefore, then, serveth the lawl It was added beeause of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the tlie merits and sacrifice of Christ ; at the birth of our Saviour the angel of the Lord declared to the shep- herds, " Behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people." p. 187. " The sin of Adam and the merits of Christ, are here pronounced to be co-ex- tensive ; the words applied to both are precisely the same. Judgment came upon all men — the free gift came upon all men. Many were made sinners — many were made righteous. "Whatever the words all men and many signify, when applied to Adam, they must signify the same when applied to Christ. It is admitted that in the former case, the whole human race is meant ; and consequently in the latter case, the whole human race is also meant. The force of the argument is destroyed ; and the raost acknowledged rules of lan- guage are violated by so interpreting thia passage, as to contend that all men are liable to punishment, on account of the sin of Adam, and that few only are en- abled to avoid that punishment through the death of Christ. Nay, we are even told, that where sin abounded, grace did much more abound ; but how can this be, if sin extends to all, and grace is confined to a part only of mankind." pp. 189, 190. I remain. Yours truly, Juncl9, 18ol. .I.B. 205 REVIEW. Some First Principles of a Christiaii Faith : the Beginning being rffade known by the End. By James Wapshare. London : Simpkin, Marshall, and Co. 1850. Nothing can be conceived more diverse than the condition of Universalism in the United States of America and in England. In the former, only one system of it seems to prevail. Since the days of John Murray and Edward Mitchell, and since the abortive efforts made about twenty-five or thirty years ago by Charles Hudson (then Rev. now Hon.), Paul Dean, and others, to set up the sect of Restorationists in opposition to that of Impartialists, every thing seems to have given way to the theory of the latter. That is, to the theory of old Hosea Ballou. Every American work on the subject of Universal Salvation which we now take up, whatever may be the constitution of its author's mind, in whatever way he may have been brought, up and inider whatever external cir cumstances he may be placed, presents to us Ballou's notions, either entire, or with some slight modifications. Christ's Deity scoffed at — his sacrifice, as the victim of divine wrath, and as by the shedding of his blood expiating sin, trampled under foot — and regeneration by light and love, the earnests of the divine nature, exchanged for moral amendment in feelings and conduct. Such is the system constantly wafted to us from across the Atlantic. It is Arianism, or rather Humanitarianism — it is human reason subjecting to itself divine reve- lation — it is, in a word, Hosea Ballou throughout. It is Moliere's^o?(/o?irs perdrix. No change. No relief. No variety.* — Not so, with us, in this old, and, in the estimation of our American friends, worn-out country. Here such is the state of Universalism, that it almost looks as if every man did that which was right in his own ei/es. Fixed human standard of doctrines and sentiments, we have none. Nallius addicti jurare, &c. At the present moment there is not visible among us any Dead Sea of sameness and formality. On the con- trary, all is stirring and tigitated, like the healing waters of tlie Pool of Bethesda, John V. Views concerning Universal Salvation with us are almost as diversified, as are the minds of those to whom in the light of Scripture, and by the teaching of God's Holy Spirit, the doctrine has approved itself as true and divine. We have Universalists holding that God inflicts limited torments hereafter; and we have Universalists who doubt, if not even deny, the endurance of sufferings by man beyond the term of this present life. We have Universalists who maintain that God restores the Old 'I'estament Israel, the land of Palestine, and the earthly Paradise; and we have Universalists who deny that God does any such thing: their view, on the contrary, being, that God has done altogether with the former state of the church and state of man, and that he is carrying matters forward from the Jewish Church in fl^'sh, to the Christian Church in spirit ; from man, in his old created state, in the Paradise on earth, to man, in his new created state, in the Paradise of God. We have Universalists inclined * The adoption of Ballouism, as the recognized formula of the system of Universal Salvation in America, although rapidly approaching to its consummation, is not yet complete. A few Arians, like our friends Whittemore and Ryder, bear up slightly ajjainst it. And in old Walter Balfour there are vestiges of his lingering attachment to a more scriptural creed. Besides the German Tunkers of Pennsylvania, and their descendants, shew pretty nnefiuivocal symptoms of their country's well-know'n tendency to free and independent tliinking. Can those who agreed with Edward Mitchell in his modified Arminian Universalism, he yet quite extinct? We have now lying before us a very able work, by H. H. Van Amringe, of Pittsburgh, Penn. (1843,) entitled " Nature and Revelation," wliich may be regarded as not less a protest against American Uuiversalism, than against the common forms of orthodoxy, so called. — Notwithstanding all these exceptions real or apparent, however, the remark in tlie text is true. The system of ^losea Ballou is at present llic predominant, and nearly the all-absorbing form of Universalist doetrine in the United States of America. 264 REVIEW. to the Arminian theory ; and we have Universalists contending for the divine sovereignty, the subserviency of creature will to the Will of God, and the election of grace, with as much firmness and decision, as Calvin himself. We have Universalists who think, that all scripture was fulfilled at the period of the destruclion of Jerusalem, and that Christ's second advent then took place ; and we have Universalists who, while they acknowledge the great and sweeping changes which occurred 40 years after our Lord's resurrection, and, especially, admit that the whole miraculous system then passed away, yet consider that prophecy is under certain aspects, and in many ways, still being fulfilled, and that it will continue to be so until the consummation of all things. In short, no one system of Universalism, existing at present in Great Britain, overshadows and overpowers every other. We have among us the greatest variety of senti- ment, and the greatest freedom of scriptural discussion. All, however, within certain bounds. Or, rather, all recognizing certain fixed divine principles. Bowing, or rather subjected to the authority of God's word, by the manifestation of its heavenly truth to us by Himself, in proportion to the increase of its influence and reign over us, reason, as shadow, is in us superseded by revelation, as substance. Hence, we neither have, nor can have anv association or com- munion with Rationalists, that is, with those who in .-iny respect whatever •would place reason in the chair of authority over Revelation — would ascribe to the human the power of interpreting the divine. I3rniers ot Christ's Deity, setters aside of the fact of his blood alone cleansing from all sin, and magnifiers of the vii-tues and destiny of human nature (of that nature which in Adam became accursed, and in Jesus is destroyed,) maj' call themselves Universalists if they will. This of course, we cannot help. But as their contempt for our antiquated notions, and narrow prejudices, as they deem them, precludes the possibility of their uniting with us, so does our love to Jesus and confidence in him, as our God as well as Saviour, combined with our sense of the honour that is due unto his name, forbid the possibility of our having any species of religious communion with them. Men who expect to reach heaven as human beings, and who fancy that their human virtues will not be altogether unavailing, even when subjected to the immediate scrutiny of God's all-seeing eye, can have nothing, except a name, in conmion with us, whose hopes of glory rest exclu- sively on our accursed human nature having been destroyed in Chiist's death, and on oiu- having been made new creatures in him, through his divine righteous- ness, and b}^ the power of his \es\u-rcction. Now lying on our table, and the immediate subject of our critical notice, is a work, the views propounded and developed in which, as in other productions of its able and respected author, although decidedly and gloriously Universalist, we find it im])0ssible to bring under tiie head of any system of Universalism, or, indeed, of any other religious ism, with which we happen to be acquainted. " What,'' it may here be enquired, " are Mr. Wapshare's habits of mind, and mode of writing ? Perhaps, a few preliminary observations with respect to these points may be serviceable, in the way not only of elucidating the character of the author, but also of explaining your present embarrassment.'' Mr. Wapshare, with great and varied learning, with abilities of a very superior order, with unquestionable originality both of thought and expression, with a highly cultivated mind, and with astonishing powers of composition, is one of the most discursive, and at the same lime, probably one of the most incom- j)rehcnsib!e writers of the present day. His extraordinary ingenuity, while to it we owe some of the most useful suggestions, and instructive ideas, concern- ing the meaning of God's word, which we recollect ever to have met with, is continually l)etraying him into mysticism, and into the employment ot language which not one reader in a hundred will be able thoroughly to apprehend. Which, indeed, not one reader in a thousand will take the tro\ible to endeavour to apprehend. Since the days of Baron Swedenborg, no theological writer so completely resembling that eminent mystic in fancy, and in the exercise of the i^ivmlivc faculty — not in his rcliginus notions, certainly — a? our author, REVIEW. 205 has Rprung up.* All that Mr. Wapshare has published displays more or less his great powers of imagination. His diagrams and pictures do so in a super- lative degree. But, however curious, taken along with the works in which they make their appearance, they tend but to perplex the mind, and baffle the comprehension of the ordinary reader. Not that our friend's productions are absolutely uninteUigible. Let a man but brace up his mind to the task of perusing, and trying to understand, Mr. Wapshare 's " Scripture Revelationsi," and the treatises by which he has followed it up, and we have no hesitation in pledging ourselves, that intellectually he Avill find himself both enriched and strengthened by the effort. He will meet with ideas thT?t he never met with before. Ideas at once new and valuable. We grant, that some things he will be startled at, and that some he will unhesitatingly reject. But if, as the result, he shall be set upon enquiring — even should his investigations terminate in his dissenting from the author — his labours will not have been entirely thrown away. Clearer views of truth in general, new relations of it previously im- observed by him, and the correction and removal of many mistakes, will not improbably constitute his reward. We can declare this to have been the effect, in our own case, of a careful study of several of Mr. Wapshare's numerous, suggestive, and most extraordinary performances. While perusing them, we have more than once held some such soliloquies as the following with ourselves : — -" Well, however ingenious and plausible, this is wrong. Wrong, as ex- pressed by the author. Some facts have escaped his notice — some phenomena have been overlooked by him — which, if taken into account, would have considerably modified his conclusions. He has forgotten Bacon's caution, against indulging too freely the tendency of the human mind, advolare in generaUa* Hence, there has been a little too much of rash and unauthor- ized theorizing. Bui, after all, does not profound truth lie couched in this observation of his ? Suppose we strip it of a little verbiage, prune it of some other excrescences and luxuriances, define somewhat more precisely the terms employed, add a few things which have been omitted, and point out a necessary distinction or two — why, then, have we not a proposition which commands our ready and unqualified acquiescence ? Have we not a truth, which, in its present form, and with the requisite qualifications, is altogether new to us? Inaccurate, and in many other respects faulty, however original, these compositions of Mr. Wapshare's are. As it is, however, has he not, just now, brought under our notice, a most valuable idea, which was previously strange to us, and for which we owe him our heartiest acknowledgments?" Whatever may be Mr. Wapshare's habits of study — irregular, although varied and extensive we suspect them to be — he is dreadfull}' discursive in his mode of writing. He is the most thorough-bred intellectual sharpshooter, whom it has been our lot to encounter. Rather, he is a sportsman, who going out nominally in quest of a particular species of game, say, grouse, blackcock, or ptarmigan, has no objections to bag hares, pheasants, partridges, or any thing else that may come in his way. His object may be to bring down some error respecting the extent of God's love ; but off, in the meantime, goes a shot at a bishop. The practices of those who substitute the darkness of reason for the light of revelation, he may be desirous to expose ; but, the opportunity having been afforded, his inclination to have a pop at the tractarians, it is im- possible for him to resist. Nay, if the birds are shy, and fly into the territory of a neighbour, he will without hesitation abandon his main argument, (what we frequently ask ourselves, is it ?) to follow them, through ten or fifteen pages, into the new ground which they have chosen. Really we learn from Mr. Wapshare, and we learn what is extremely valuable. But we pay well for our * In the indulgence of fancy, and in a faculty of comparison which suggests the most unex- pected resemblances, Professor Bush, of New York, the able and learned author of "Anastasis." and the devoted admirer of Swedenborg, is never once to be named in the same day with Mr, Wapshare. t Vid. Kuium Organuin. 206 REVIEW. instruction. We are constrained to follow him, through ficlil and brake, in breathless haste, in his almost endless excursions and discursions. To drop metaphor : no two minds, both most able, can be conceived more diverse in their respective methods of treating a subject, than those of Mr. Bond, whose merits we last month strove to draw attention to, and Mr. Wapshare. In the former, all is logic, point, and condensation, sometimes almost to a degree that is painful. By the latter, we are kept continually on the trot, dropping one idea to run after another, until in not a few instances the spot from which we originally started, is lost completely in the haze of distance. After what we have thus said, in reply to a supposed question put by the reader, as to Mr. Wapshare's leading mental qualities and style, should we be asked what is his peculiar system of Uiiiversalism ? we confess that in answering it, we would experience no small degree of difficulty. In the treatise now before us, it is presented. So is it at greater length, and with greater minuteness, in his other, and larger Avorks. All able — all clever — ail learned and in- genious — all worth perusing. The one now under review we have, as in duty bound, read with more than ordinary care. That in our friend's view, the fact of God's being love assures the ultimate salvation of the world, is plain. That in his opinion, no human resistance can countervail or frustrate the divine purpose, is manifest likewise. Many most just, pointed, and scriptural proofs of this he adduces. But he is constantly puzzling us with sentiments winch we find it impossible to reconcile, we do not say with those of Calvin, but with those of Scripture. Is there not something which looks like — we do not say that is — an identification of Satan with Christ ? Is not the language used such frequently as to seem to confound the Church with the world in the matter of salvation, nay, to do away witii the distinction between the Church and the world altogether? Does not he represent obedience to the prohibitions and commands of law on the part of the creature, as identical witli the opera- tion of love? — the fact being, that love, as the principle of the divine nature, is not subject to law, and that of itself the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesiu, it constrains to and produces effects corresponding to its own nature, quite independently of the power of any other and inferior system of law. Rom. vi. 14. Other objections we have. But we wave the consideration of them. We do not — we cannot — understand Mr. Wapshare's system as a whole. Glorious truths he propounds, and scripturally establishes. The Deity of the Lord Jesus he clearly maintains, and in his atoning sacrifice he clearly rejoices. But does he understand new-creation, or see how carried into effect through Christ risen and glorified the new-creation supersedes the old? Isaiah xlv. 17. 2 Cor. v. 17. 2 Peter iii. 12, 13. Kev. xxi. 1 — 5. Some passages look as if he did so. And yet many other passages seem to intimate, that, according to his notions, human nfiture is amended and perpetuated. We confess ourselves fairly puzzled. We strongly suspect, that concerning the subjects of divine mediation, and the distinction between human nature and the divine nature, his views are vague, and rather philosophical than scriptural. Perhaps, in thus judging we are mistaken. Dear Mr. Wapshare, could you in four, five, or even eight or ten, or any reasonable number of simply ex- pressed and eategorical propositions say, how, in your apprehension, atonement is carried into effect ? What in reference to human nature, is implied in new- creation ? Is mind identical with spirit? What are the peculiar privileges of the Church of Christ, both here and hereafter ? Is sin properly inherent in flesh, to the exclusion of mind? What is the Church of Christ? Is it exter- nal, or does it consist of a body of individuals who never had, and never can have external unity, and are destined only to appear united at the resurrection of the Just? In what respect are the members of the Church the objects of divine election? How is the will of man subject to the will of God, and how is man's responsibility shewn to be strictly and thoroughly reconcilable with the Sovcrt'i;^'iily of God? You often speak, dear friend, as if the clergy of the ChuDch of Kriglaud were Christ's ministers. How, unlcso tho Chuich of REVIEAV. 207 England, and the Clmicli of Clnist be identical can lliin be? Surely Me Church of the living God, ike general assemblg of the firat- horn whose names are written in heaven, is something essentially different from anv human in- stitution, past or present. Have the goodness to say, too, in brief and intelli- gible pbi-aseology, how divine law, as consisting of prohioitions and commands, Exodus XX. &c. and as having had Christ for the end and fulfiller of it, Rom. X. 4, is reconcilable with the imposition of law, in the same form, on believers of the gospel ? Especially, when Rom. vi. 14. declares, that Christians are not under the law, hut under grace, and when the whole scope of the chapter in which those words occur is to shew, that love, not law, is the source of heavenly and divine conduci ? Perhaps having answei-ed preceding questions, you will kindly furnish us with a key, by making use of which we may be enabled to understand, how appai'ently conflicting passages of your works are to be rendered self-consistent. Do try, dear friend. With your great abilities, and putting a little restraint upon your discursive propensities, surely what is now asked for may be easily accomplislied. We have said that Mr. Wapshare is disciusive. And so he is. Rambling from topic to topic continually. But we do not feel inclined to say, that to the same extent he is diffuse. Whatever may be the subject that for the time being he takes up, his style is singularly lively and energetic. As a not un- favourable specimen of his mode of writing, we submit the following : — " The sum of all truth, as of all faith, is that God the Creator is, in Christ crucified, the Redeemer of the world created by him. In Christ crucified, the light is given by which heresy retraces its steps, and the wanderer is brought back to God, the God of all truth. For the truth is this: that as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive. For as born into the flesh ye have all borne bis earthy image ; (which image we have seen is that of sin ;) so also shall you all bear his heavenly image ; being in the resurrection made like unto Christ. (1 John iii.) For our God is the Saviour of sinners. We, as created, as carnal, are the hody of sin — there is none righteous no not one. He, therefore, came not to call the righteous, but sinners unto repentance calling upon every man to know God, as only wise and holy ; a God of Grace, the Saviour of a World, the Spirit of Love that pardoneth every sin, (Ps. ciii.)' " Pride rejects this doctrine of the perfect satisfaction made for sin, and the salvation of the whole world ; as clearly written, 1 John ii. 2 : a doctrine which to the Jew, or the disciple of the law is a stumbling block, and is foolish- ness unto the wise of the Gentiles. These, while preaching salvation by faith, make it conditional on works ; as on some meritorious act, or mental deed of their own! So confounding themselves and others. Are these not foolish? (Rom. iii. and iv.) These stagger not at the principles here laid down; but draw back at the necessary conclusion ! They see not that ' to enter the king- dom of Heaven' is a mental or spiritual possession of the truth, by which the believer in the salvation of our God hath peace with God on earth, a foretaste of the peace which in heaven is etei'nal. It is Belief which gives this peace. To this knowledge, and to the peace of Faith many are called, but few are chosen, For the power is not with man, but with God. The knowledge to Avhich the elect few, or those which are thus chosen attain is the gift of God • — is by the predeterminate counsel of His will, who knew the end from the beginning ; they being elected unto faith, that they might preach faith unto those who are bound by the law, as the power of God unto salvation (i Cor. i. 24.) We say, this faith which the elect receive by hearing — and that by the hearing of the word of God, and not by the dogmas of men, — shall by the ])reaching of those who receive it, be the common faith of the whole world. For all, from the vising of the sun unto the going down thereof, shall believe in the salvation of our God. (See Jude 3, and 24, 25. Is. xlv. 21.)" " Faith worketh love both to God and man. He therefore who hath the true faith goes forth as a Preacher out of love to God, (2 Cor. v. 14,) and not to please himself, or, in any manner to profit himself. And his preaching ia 208 KEVFEW. to this efiect. GoJ, in the heginning, called from out the coiintlesa host of Heaven, one whom, as created luiiii, he ordained to be the Father of all man- kind ; making him a little lower tliaii the angels, tliat by knowledge he might be raised above them. This, his seed, is called a natural seed. Of this natural seed God called or elected also one, even Abraham, to be the Father of a select body — a body to be tauglit of God, and to bring in salvation in the person of Jesus, as prefigured by the offerings of the law, and especially by the Paschal Lamb. For the law, as given by Moses, is figurative in all its works ; the Paschal Lamb being for a figure of Him who as the giver of the Law, in putting an end to the law of works, is the bringer-in of a better hope. For the Law maketh nothing perfect. Under it man lives by sight, and not by faith." (?) " God, therefore, when making an end of the law, elected some out of the Gentile world, as called by his Apostles, to be the recipients of His truth — even that the whole law is fulfilled by Love — a truth which no man could have discovered — but which is revealed from Heaven by His Holy Spirit, — the Spirit of Christ Jesus crucified — the Spirit that spake unto Saul — the Spirit of Divine Love, which in sanctifying the heart, makes of the per- secutor a new man. We say, this is that Truth which the Gentile Church, or the Body that is elect of God to worship Him in spirit and in truth, are called on to believe. But have they heard the voice that calls to them ? Verily, they have heard; but they have not believed its report! Are there, then, none who have believed? Yea, truly, ihere are. But these are His secret ones; a peculiar people, (Titus ii. 14;) a people condemned as heretical, and whose voice is not heard amid the tens of thousands of those who preach the wisdom of men, and not the wisdom of God. 1 Cor. ii. 5, 8.) Would you know them? Go to the haunts of poverty — to the outcasts of the world — to the couch of sickness — to the bed of death. There will you find them in whom is His Spirit distributing to the needy the supplies necessary for our human wants ; and pouring into the soul, the oil and wine of an undoiibting faith — the faith that proclaims love to all, and the glad tidings of salvation (Is. 1. ii.) Such love melts the sinner's heart : who receives his visitor as an angel from God, Such love asks no questions as to particular sins, — for all are sinners — but calls on every man to strike the conscious breast, .saying, God be merciful to me a sinner — a confession which is to every man the seal and surety of salvation, — for it brings Wisdom to the proud. (1 John i. 9, 10; James v. 16.)'' &c. p. 13—17. " Some first principles" &c. consists of two parts : first, The principles themselves laid down, (?) ; a part which extends from page 3 to page 40 ; and, secondly, a " Postscript," concerning tlie Bisiiop of London, the Bishop of Exeter, the Gorham Controversy, Tractarianism, and various other important matters, occupying the rest of the pamphlet, from page 41 to page 90. Truly, the activity, energy, and learning of Mr. Wapshare, and his desire to promote the interests of his fellow men are marvellous. He states honestly and fear- lessly what he believes to be truth, and he evinces himself to be a zealous opponent of error, in whatever form it may present itself. Have we put the proper interpretation upon Mr. VVapshare's language when we regard him as maintaining the dogma of creature free-will? He certainly seems, on more tiian one occassion, to express himself to this effect ; and yet we hesitate in ascribing to him an opinion, which would set one part of his theory at variance with another. The gentleman upon one of whose productions we have now been com- menting, will we are certain, excuse the freedom which we have used both with him and with it. Although personally unknown to us, he has long been the object of our unqualified respect ; and if one feeling more than another has predominated in our mind while composing this article, it has been that of re- gret, that endowed with such talents, and possessed of such an acquaintance with the scriptures, as he evidently is, he should have failed to do himself the justice that he deserves. D. T. THE UNIVERSALIST. SEPTEMBER, 1851. THE UNKNOWN GOD. " Man is a worshipping animal," says a certain writer, " and an ani- mal so morally prone, though physically erect (what a centre of strange extremes is he!) that he tends downwards though with his eye he pierce the heavens." Downwards truly ! Even when his imaginary gods have been endowed with greater strength, with higher powers and brighter glory — what beasts ! what brutes ! what monsters ! — ^how how cruel, despotic, unjust and ignoble they have been ! When his eye has led him to people the bright heavens above with arbiters of his des- tiny, his heart has invested them with those attributes which constitute the very worst manifestations of his prone nature : and thus the sun has been turned into darkness and the moon into blood and the stars have fallen from heaven ! And man — the noblest in form and feature of God's works — has regarded his own image as a suitable object of wor- ship. But here again his prone disposition has worked itself out in the vilest, ugliest, and most monstrous shapes of burlesque and caricature conceivable. Why, man ! why did you not take the living object, or at least employ your skill in sculpturing the best representation, rather than mock thyself and thy Maker with such insulting figures and fancies ? Nor does his prone disposition find its ne plus ultra here. " Vain in his imaginations, his foolish heart was darkened," and to the "image made like to corruptible man," were added " birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things." The grossest superstitions, the most flagrant immorality, the lowest degradation, are invariably found connected with the lowest views of deity ; and we are persuaded, that, ou the contrary, in proportion to the purity and truth of the idea of the God who is worshipped by a man or a people, will be the purity and elevation of the worshipper. But the God of whom man conceives is naturally endowed with those attributes of which his own consciousness informs him ; and thus he thinks of Him as altogether such an one as himself. Our gobd folks laugh at the idol curiosity which the missionary brings home from those who have been induced to abandon their worship, but we sometimes think that if the God of these Christian people could be revealed to the eye, he would not present a very striking contrast to the heathen idea, and that many an innocent would be perplexed, and in his wonderment would ask if it be God or devil. The woman of Samaria who boasted of the worship her father's had for ages offered on Gerizim was told by Him who revealed the true God — " Ye worship ye know not what;'' and the Athenians ignorantly worshipped at the altar erected to the unknown God. The Jews who VOL. II. 2 G 210 THE UNKNOWN GOD. boasted of their descent from those who had direct visible communion with God, were told by Him who kneiv their hearts, that they were of their father the devil. And while men self-complacently deified the offspring of their own corrupt imagination, they were reproved b)'^ God manifest in the flesh, who declared that noman hnoweth the Father but the Son, and he to whom the Son should reveal him. The fatherhood of God and the sonship of man are the media of mutual recognition; hence the words, / never knew you, are applicable to all who have not yet been brought into this intimate relationship with the Father, a relation- ship based upon and subsisting by love. Hence also the apostle John writes, " He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love." The Athenians were superstitious — they ignorantly worshipped the unknown God — they assigned to him a dwelling place made with hands — they failed to recognize his paternal relationship to the whole race of man — they made light of the resurrection of the dead. We think these Athenians have their descendants in the present day throughout the Christian world, and that the apostles might appropriately preach a similar sermon to that which he delivered on Mars' hill to many a pro- fessing Christian congregation. 1. Superstition is the child of ignorance : hence the devotion of ig- norance will be always found in close alliance with superstition. " Ministers of religion" — the very phrase has become rank with supei*- stition — ministers — and we do not especially blame them, people love to have it so — are an order of inferior mediators between God and man. The sacredness of religion is enhanced by their authority ; the eiRcacy of prayer is augmented by their official devotion. The validity of bap- tism is unquestioned if performed by their consecrated hands ; and while with some the administration of the Lord's supper by an unor- dained functionary is all but a desecration, the partaking of it without a minister at all is utter profanit}' ! The mother must be " churched" by the minister : the child must be " christened" by the minister : the young man must be married by the minister : and the old man must have " Christian burial" at the hands of the minister — and a vast amount of religion is infused and consequent benefit realized by all this ministry. The charm of baptism, the passport of the supper, and the " service" (!) for the dead and the other functions of the clerical office are only one congeries of superstitious forms by which modern Athens is characterized. In a thousand ways, as respect God's being, providence, and grace, Paul might now say, " I see ye are loo superstitious." 2. Though God be not avowedly worshipped as the unknown God, yet he is so worshipped. His nature is not known. Would the Christian world be so full of querulousness, jealousy, hatred, wrath, strife, if they knew the nature of God? Would there be so much suspicion of his goodness, so much uncertainty of hope, so much dread of his wrath, so wavering a faith, so doubting a love (where love exists) if they knew that God's nature was love ? Would there be so servile a spirit, such a " bondage spirit" as Cromwell has it — such meanness, such fear, such want of confidence, so much spurious humility, if their God's paternal, loving nature were known ? 3. And then how Athenian-like is the conduct of those who bear the name of Christian in reference to the dwelling-place of the Infinite. THE UNKNOWN GOD. 211 When we hear a Bishop pleading in the house of Lords for a worthy and becoming locale — greatly concerned at the thought that some pro-^ testants at Rome worship the Father of their spirits in so lowly a place as a granary — a matter about which the apostles appear never to have troubled themselves — we are reminded of the formal, outward, cere- monial character of the religion even of enlightened Protestants. The building appropriated to divine service (?) is called " the house of God,"* "the gates of Zion," "the temple," " the church," &c. ; and the Almighty is presumed to manifest himself especially in such a place. Hence a sacredness is attached to it. To enter it is to come into God's presence, and to leave it is to be dismissed from the presence of the Lord, — and the service is over. " Howbeit, the most High dwell- eth not in temples made with hands." Acts vii. 48. 4. The Athenians did not recognise the fact that all men are made of one blood, and are the offspring of God. The Apostle James speaking of that unruly member, the tongue, says " Therewith bless we God even the father, and therewith curse one man, M'ho is made in the like- ness of God." There stands a worshipper, thanking God for his dis- criminating grace and distinguishing love ; he blesses his Maker that he has been made to differ from an ungodly world — that he does not lie and steal, that he believes in Jesus Christ and hopes through his merits and persevering faith to have an abundant entrance into heaven. In one pocket he has the receipt for the dollars he paid only yesterday for yonder piece of goods — an abject slave, who has just been torn from wife and children and home for ever. From the other pocket protrudes the cat-o-nine-tails with which he is not sparing in asserting his Chris- tian dignity. This Christian and that poor slave are of one blood — the offspring of the same Almighty power. There declaims the humanly- appointed and self-designated " Ambassador for Christ." Now he speaks the words of hope and consolation: the Holy Spirit is complimented upon the success of the embassy. He promises his flock that on the attainment of a certain amount of knowledge, faith, and experience, and practice of good works they shall be allowed to cherish the hope that the gates of hell shall never prevail against them. — And to the rest— the unclean, whom, to the astonishment of poor Peter, God pro- nounced to be cleansed, he is, guided by assumed divine authority, (you might sometimes think he was swearing) dealing out endless damnation with most orthodox zeal and prodigality. He is the ambassador of he knows not who, forgetting that God has made of one blood and i-e- deemed with one blood all nations upon the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and even the bounds of their habi- tation, a truth alike destructive of the Pharisaic boasting engendered by by the one, and the black despair often produced by the other mode of address. And 5. The Athenians mocked at the resurrection of the dead. The go- vernment of the world by Jesus Christ was the doctrine, for the truth of which he adduced as proof the fact of his resurrection from the dead. The subject of the apostolic preaching was "Jesus and the resurrection." * " Whose house are we" writes an inspired apostle. The temple of the Jews was typical of that edifice built up oi livinff strnnes, whereof the apostles are the foundations, Jesus Christ him- self being the c'h:ef corner stone. 212 SIR GEORGE STONHOUSE, ETC. There are some in the present day who call in question the fact of the resurrection of Jesus, and there are more who keep in the back ground the vital importance of the doctrine of the resurrection. We hear far more of the death of Christ than we do of his life. But the resurrection of Christ is our only hope. Had he merely died and not risen again our faith would be vain — there would be no future life. But there is rtot a Scripture fact for which greater and more irrefragible proof is afforded. Christ rose to God's right hand, he rose to immortality — to a blessed life. His resurrection is the ground as well as the pledge of ours — of all men. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. By creation, God, through Adam, sustains a relation to all men ; by new creation or resurrection, he, through the second Adam, sustains a relation to all men likewise. The first is natural, the second is spi- ritual ; and the former is the type of the latter. But of superstition — ignorance — worldliness — selfishness — and Sad- uceeism a thick veil has been woven by which the perfections of the Almighty have been concealed. Upon it the dust of eighteen centuries has been settling — dust raised by those w^hose feet which should have been beautiful as the messengers of the gospel of peace. The Church instead of reflecting the divine benignity has presented a sadly distorted image, and the treasures of which it has been the depository have been cruelly and criminally locked up in its own Pharisaic exclusiveness. The liv- ing waters, of which if a man drink he shall never thirst, have been measured out from their own poluted tanks of stagnation, and the bread of life has been doled out at " high protection pricies,'' adulterated, and almost burnt up with the heat of their terrible fire : they would " guard the gospel," in utter obliviousness of the twelve baskets of fragments after the multitude had all eaten and were filled, and of the hand which is open to supply the wants of every living thing. And as long as the vindictive, unjust, unholy unmerciful, unloving and unlovely doc- trine which assigns millions and millions of our fellow creatures to the jaws of eternal, unutterable woe, is maintained, we have little hope that the matter will be better understood. " Oh ! righteous Father, the world hath not known thee." J. P. SIR GEORGE STONHOUSE AND UNIVERSAL RESTITUTION. Universal Restitution, considered as a Scripture doctrine, was first debated between the years 1729 — 1735 by a Society of twelve young Collegians of Oxford, emphatically called the Holy Club, who at length disagreed and split into different factions. John Wesley was the tutor, and, of course, president of this Society ; and he, with his brother Charles, Mr. Morgan and one or two more, supported the merit of works. George Whitfield and James Hervey (author of the Meditations) adopted the Calvinistic side of the question. Messrs. Delamottc, Hall, Hutchins and Ingram trimmed, and became Moravians. The Rev. George Stonhouse of Hungerford Park (afterwards Sir George Stonhouse of East Brent in the county of Somerset; Baronet), had been labouring to reconcile the different opinions of his fellow SIR GEORGE STONHOUSE, ETC. 213 collegians, till he stood alone in support of his favourite tenet ; viz. that Univei-jal Restitution was a scripture doctrine ; and as the argu- ments he used with his different opponents had ever prevailed, they severally promised him that if he would collect his thoughts together in a discourse upon that subject, it should receive a candid answer. He married, in 1739, a daughter of Sir John Crisp, Bart, a niece and heiress of Sir Nicholas Crisp, Bart., with whom he had an elegant seat at Darnford near Blenheim, Oxon, which he left to go on his travels with the sole view of consulting the Syriac copies ot the New Testament in the different libraries of Europe, under the idea that our Lord delivered his discourses in Syriac and not in Greek. He was on his travels near twenty years, twelve of Avhich he spent in Germany, chiefly with Count Zinzendorf. During his peregrination he became such a proficient in the Syriac tongue, that he wrote a very cojdIous grammar of that lan- guage, and was so indefatigable in his Scrij)ture studies that he was able immediately and without hesitation to translate any passage in the Bible into thirteen different languages. He published his "Universal Restitution, a Scripture Doctrine," in 1761, a volume of 468 pages octavo, sold by Dodsley, London, and Cadell of Bristol. Although this book surprised the learned Avorld, it was never answered. A Quaker, indeed, of Philadeljihia corresponded with the author upon some points of it, which produced his "Universal Restitution further defended'' (148 pages, 8vo.,) and was printed by W. Pine of Bristol, 1768, and sold also by Dodsley, London. The following conversation occurred between John Wesley and Stonhouse about 1771 — Stonhouse. Ah! John, there are only you and I living out of us all. IVesJey. Better you had died too, George, before you had written your book. Stonhouse. I expected you would have eaten up my book at a mouthful, John, but neither you nor any of the rest, though you all engaged to do it, have yet answered a single paragraph of it. Wesley. You must not think your book unanswerable on that account. I am able to answer it, but it would take up so much of my time that I could not answer it to God." This declaration so stung Sir George as to put him upon writing "Universal Restitution vindicated against the Calvinists," (176 pages 8vo.) and printed by Farley, Bristol, 1773. He also published, "Evangelical History defended in answer to Farm- er's Enquiry," for which 1 have no date. In 1786 he also published "ApostolicalConceptionsof God, in a series of Letters" (180 pagesSvo). In 1 787 a second part of the last tract (160 pages). He died at a good old age, 5th December, 1793, and was buried at East Brent, Somerset- shire where he had purchased an estate of £700 per ann,, and resided upon it the last twenty years of his life. He was presented to the Vicarage of Islington, 1738, and resigned it in 1741, in consequence of a dispute he had with a wealthy dissenter, to whom he refused to ad- minister the sacrament in a qualified way : after some time and money spent in law, both became tired, and the public were not the wiser for the termination of the suit. His Works, first published 1761, and others subsequently up to 1787, have all remained unanswered to the present time. IJniversal Restitution having thus been before the public ninety years asaScripture 214 AVHAT IS THE GOSPEL? Doctrine must remain as such till these several books shall be refuted. In consequence of a dispute between his great-grandfather and his grandfather, the former resigned the patent of the Baionetage into the hands of Charles II. and obtained a new patent for a younger son ; he therefore succeeded to the title on the death of a nephew. He would not permit himself to be distinguished by it either in his letters, deeds, or securities, or even in his will. He died without male issue Dec. 5, 1793, as stated before ; and as he succeeded a nephew he was succeed- ed by a nephew. The Rev. James Stonhouse, M. D. Rector of Great and Little Cheverel, Wilts, residing at Bristol Hot Wells, who published in 1788 " Every man's assistant and the sick man's friend" (Dedicated to his son. Rev. Timothy Stonhouse of Oriel College, Oxford) died Dec. 8, 1795, aged 80, enjoying the title only 2 years and 3 days. It further appears that the nephew whom Sir George, our author, suc- ceeded, was Sir James, who died at Ragley, April 13, 1792, aged 74. Sir George therefore did not enjoy the title 20 months. J. B. WHAT IS THE GOSPEL? {Evtxyye/joy) a good message. Good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. This was the announcement of the angel to the shepherds, on that day of days, when that Saviour, which was Christ the Lord, was born into the world ; and a multitude of the heavenly host praised God, saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men — all men — great joy to all people ; not to the elect alone, not to those alone who do ( that is, imagine they do or can do ) something to save themselves, but to all — bad and good. What follows ? What is involved in this proclamation recorded by an inspired Evangelist, and therefore not to be gainsayed ? Nothing more nor less than this — that all born in Adam, and through him inheriting sin and death, are by the second Adam, Christ the Lord, m,ade to inhe- rit righteousness and life everlasting. This is the Gospel, good news, or glad tidings. It is not that men may be saved if they repent and do good works ; not that they are saved if they believe in Christ as their Saviour ; but that they are already saved, justified, ransomed, redeemed. Just as surely as they inherit sin and death from Adam so surely do they in- herit righteousness and Life everlasting from Christ the Lord. No priest, no minister, no teacher, can in any conceiveable way affect their state with regard to their ultimate Salvation or reception of Eter- nal Life. That is theirs as "the gift of God" although the nmltitude — the World, knoweth it not. All that the Minister, teacher, parent or friend can do, is to make this known as a matter of fact to those to whom the opportunity for declaring it is vouchsafed. And this is the grand mistake of the promoters of all religious societies and institutions: that they profess to have for their object "the glory of God and the salva- tion of souls," if they inean by this that they have the power to add any thing to the finished work of Ciuist Jesus (and this (hey must mean WHY IS NOT THE I'OVE THE AN'TICHRIST? '215 if their language have any meaning at all). The idea is preposterous! But they will ask have we power to do nothing for our fellow creatures ? Yes. We may proclaim to them the good news which we ourselves have heard and believed, that Christ is the Saviour of all men ; or if there appear in any, a tendency to Socinian notions, or a too high esti- mate of the powers and purity of human nature, we may endeavour to convince them, from God's Word, that all are grievous sinners, that from birth to natural death, every imagination of the thoughts of our hearts, is only evil continually and that as the punishment of one trans- gression is death, none can have a right as born in Adam to inherit more than Adam's life, and none whatever to the possession of Eternal Life, which never was possessed by Adam in his own right, but which must belong exclusively to that Being to whom appertains every other infinite attribute. Let us endeavour to do all that can be done (and much may be accomplished) in improving the moral and physical condition of our fellow creatures, but their final destiny let us not think to alter. It cost more to redeem their souls, so that we must let that alone for ever. Ps. xlix. 8. (Prayer book translation.) J. C. AN ANSWER TO THE QUESTION, WHY IS NOT THE POPE THE ANTI-CHRIST. First, because the Antichrist is spoken of in Scripture as an individual, and is neither a system, as Popery, nor a succession of individuals in that system as the Popes. The Antichrist is called in Scripture " a vile person" Dan.xi. 21. " Ike King" Dan.xi. 36 "'/'he idol S/iep/ierd" Zech. xi. 17. " That man of Sin, the So7i of perdition'^ 2. Thess. ii. 3. ^^The beast" Rev. xiii. 4. xvii. 17. " Aiiticbrist" 1 John ii. 18. " The abomination that maketli desolate" which is, " the Man of sin sitting in tlie Temple of God sliewing himself that he is God." If then tiiis man of sin shall sit in the Temple of God, the Temple must be built, which it is not yet, and the Jews must be a nation, which they are not yet; but that this will be the case can be proved by various passages of Scripture, such as the following, Jer. XXX. 1. ix. 24. Ez. xxxviii. 8 — 16 and xxxix. 2 — 4 Joel ii, iii. Zech. xii, xiv. Rev. xi. 2. Matt. xxiv. 15. These chapters also prove that Jerusalem shall be be- sieged in the latter day, by the Gentiles headed by the Anti-christ, who will tread it down for 1260 days or three years and a half, and that these days are connected with the abomination, compare Matt. xxiv. 15 — 22. with Dan. xii. 7 — 11, and Rev. xi. 3, xii. 6 — 14. xiii. 5. Christ comes immediately after these days, see Matt. xxiv. 29. Compare Dan. xii. 1. 2, 13 with Matt. xxiv. 21, 31. And at the coming of Christ the Bea.=!t or Anti-chi-ist and the false Prophet shall be cast alive into the lake of tire. See Rev. xix. 11 to end. Secondly, because the Anti-christ will deny the Father and the Son, 1 John 2 — 22, which none of the Popes have ever done, for they confess both. Anti-christ will also deny that Christ came in thejlesh, which the Popes have never done, as is shewn by their images of the Virgin and Child. Thirdly, because the Anti-christ w'ill deny every God, and set himself up above all Gods, Dan. xi. 36, 2 Thes. ii. 4. which the Popes have never done; on the contrary they say they are the vicegerents of Christ. Fourthly because St. Peter's at Rome is not the Temple of God, for there was only 07ie Temple, but there are thousands of Roman Catholic Chapels, and therefore St. Peter's cannot be the Temple of God. And lastly, the inconsistency of calling the Pope the Anti-christ and the place where he is worshipped (for if he be Anti-chi ist he must be worshij)[ied 216 POETRY, ETC. Rev. xiii. 4.) the Temple of Goi. It ought rather to be called the Temple of Antichrist or Belial. I think it is now fully proved from Scripture that the Pope is not the Anti- christ, but at the same time I must say that he is Atiti-christian because he sub- verts God's truth by the traditions of men. T\\e Spirit oi Anti-christ existed in the Apostle? days, and we may say the same of these days, for whatever is opposed to Christ is an Anti-christ. But it is reserved for the laffer days of this dispensation for the personal Anti- christ to appear. Satan will then put forth all his power in the person of this Anti-christ, for he will be the seed of the Serpent, see Gen ii. 15. 2 Thes. ii. 9. Rev. xiii. 2 — 4, and then will be seen the great enmity between the seed of the Woman a.nA \he seed oi \\\e Serpent, or between Christ and Anti-Christ. It will be thy crisis of the world, for then will be the great battle between Christ and Anti-Christ, but we know who shall get the victory (see Rev. xix.) even Jesus the mighty one of God, who will consume the Anti-christ by the spirit of his mouth, and destroy him with the brightness of his coming, and who shall shut up the Dragon, that old Serpent which is the Devil and Satan, in the bot- tomless pit, that he should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years should be fulfilled. See Rev. xx. Come then, O Jesus, thou mighty Conqueror, and take unto thee thy great power and reign. Amen. Maria Morgan. POETRY. THE GRAVE OF THE SUICIDE. I entered a village graveyard a few days since, impelled by a desire to know what epitaph had been placed upon the tombstone of a suicide, whose relatives were believers in endless misery. 1 found written thereon these words: " For as in Adam all die even so in Christ shall all be made alive." 1 Cor. xv. 22. Oh ! words of hope, how sweet ye fell Upon the mourning widow's heart, When earthly voices failed to cheer, Nor dared one comfort to impart , Then turning from the creeds of men How clun^' that heart to heavenly things, Trusting that from God's holy book, Some dove of peace might spread her wings. And it hath shed some rays of light On that green grave where Sidney lies. Whose trembling hand had closed the life Which seemed a burden in his eyes ; Oh! weakness, born of doubting faith, How clouded it with gloomy fears. The path whereon his footsteps trod, Through his last sad and trying years. But ye have left him with his God, Prompted by that strong faith of heart Which lack of creeds of early life Forms of its inmost chords a part. Oh! may we cherish that true faith That leads us by our Father's hand, That bids us trust him through all time And live or die at his command. H. L. "GOD IS LOVE." "If but these words that Book contained On which our every hope is built, T'would be enough, though we had drain'd The very dregs of grief and guilt, Love will not harm, — Love will z\ot pause Tn doing good to aught that's dear, Till nature doth reverse her laws, And thwart high Heaven in its career. Julia H. Scott. UNIVERSALISM IN PLYMOUTH, &c. The cause of Universalism is making considerable progress in Plymouth. Our readers were, doubtless, gratified with the Report of "The English Uni- versalists' Re-iding Society, Octagon, wliich appeared last year in The Uniyer- salist. They will be still more gratified to learn that the meetings of the Society have for some time been so inconveniently crowded that a room capable of accommodating between 400 and 500 persons, is being erected in a command- ing position, and there is no doubt that when opened it will be well filled. The Library is enriched by many old and scarce books as well as modern works on the subject of I'niversalisin, — and these are in constant circulation. Acting under the constraining influence of the love of Christ, Mr. Georse Johnson and others in concert with him, have been the means of accomplish- ing much for the cause of truth. The Rev. William Seahrook whose consis- tent piety, learning, and abilities as a preacher are well known in Plymouth, is, we are happy to hear, settled among our friends. '• tllK DYING UNIVERSALIST •' AGAIN'. ANECDOTES. 217 Mk. Jamks WiiiTMARsir, of Melbxiry, wlio has for nearly half a cenluvy been ■a puljlic advocate of the doctrine of God's unbounded love, in the neighbour- hood of Shaftesbury, Wilts, has been permitted after a severe affliction to resume his labours. May the health of this venerable defender of the faith be yet preserved! The friends associated with Mr. Whitmarsh are in posses- sion of some of Kelly's letters and MSS. one of which "The Christian Min- istry'' they have recently published. These documents were committed to them some few years age by a late daughter of the celebrated preacher of Universalism, and author of " The Union'' S:c. We are happy to think that they have been preserved from the flames, to which a Clergyman, with true orthodox zeal, was anxious to consign them, and offered their proprietor £10 that he might be enabled to realize his object. Query, what would this brave urotestant have given to have their writer in his power? "THE DYING UNIVERSALIST" AGAIN! We have received from a Glasgow correspondent a tract, entitled "The Dying Universalist ;'' issued by a Tract Society in the City of Glasgow. It is the identical story by the Rev. Dr. Spencer whicli appeared in T/ie Christian Treasury and was noticed in our number for March. Tiie greatest atrocities have been perpetrated under the mask of religion : under tlie plea of zeal for the Lord of Hosts have been wrouglit the greatest desolations, — have been committed the foulest crimes ! The prison, the tor- ture, the sword, tlie stake, the axe, have all been called by the valiant for the truth to minister to the interests of " our holy religion." But there is a sharper and more destructive weapon, a poison most deadly, which has sometimes been employed witli effect. It is tlie poison of the serpent — slander. Such is the Aveapon with which our friends at Glasgow have been assailed. We pity the ignorance of those who have a zeal for God wliich is not according to know- ledge! Astonishing, that they should cxpact to gain converts to Christianity by maligning some of their Clu-istian brethren ! Paul was intensely desirous to save sinners ; and he submitted to all manner of deprivation and self sacri- fice "if by any means he might gain some.'' But he did not slander — allhough he was often slandered. May those who disseminate this tract soon leani tliat if they would promote Christianity they must use Christian means, and that to misrepresent and cast reproach upon those who trust in the living God who is the Saviour of all men, they will eventually be put to confusion. Faith actuating the heart, and evinced in the life, is a shield which will quench all the fiery darts of the adversary. Let our friends in Glasgow, then, be of good courage. Though reviled they will not threaten ; being defamed, as the}' have opportunitv, they will entreat : not rendering evil for evil, but contrariwise blessing. Jf ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye, for then tlie Spirit of glory and of God resteth on you. Be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always aboiuiding in the work of the Lord, for as much as ye know that yoiu* labor shall not be in vain in the Lord. ANECDOTES FOR THE SOCIAL CIRCLE. The same Mr. L. named in page 199, was once urged by his ncighbotir, a Presbyterian Deacon, to accompany him to a protracted meeting held a few 7niles distant — assuring L. that he would be greatly edified by the exercises, as "the Spirit of the Lord was powerfully at work in their midst.'' "I doubt it'' said L, "for I feel persuaded that what you call the Spirit of the Lord, can all he shown to bo fire from hell, in a short time." However after some parleying Ji 2 21S REVIEWS. it, was agreed that Mr. L, should accompany the deacon next day, and slidnld be allowed to address the meeting. There was snow on the ground, and they went together in the deacon's conveyance. The meeting was a large and a very excited one. At last, toward evening, L. reminded the deacon of his promise ; the deacon with some little difficulty obtained permission of the preachers pi-e- sent for L. to speak ; L's subject was ancient and modern Phariseeism ; and so closely did he measure, cut, and fit the garment, that he was ordered to stop. But the stream flowed on. Singing was resi.rted to, to drown his voice. But his voice rose so as to drown the singing. With furious looks, they laid hold of him and threw him out into the snow — his neighbour, the deacon interposing and remonstrating in vain and following him out with much sympathy. L. calmly arose, and coolly brushing off the snow, turned smilingly to his friend and said — "There, what do you think of that spirit of the Lord now ? Is it not turned into pretty hot hell-fire, think you ?'' — Univeisalist Companion for 1851. A horseman having lost his way, made a complete circle. When the first round was finished, he saw the tracks of his horse, and said — "This, at least, shows me that I am in some track.'' When the second circuit was finished, he supposed he had come to a beaten path ; and as the tracks increased at every round, he at last supposed he was on the highway to some populous village. - It is thus that the beaten tracks of error are generally made, until they are taken for the general consent of the world, and the authority of the Church Universal ! — Ibid. The following conversation, in substance, took place between a Calvinistic Clergyman and a Universalist, in Hardwick — Univeisalist. But can you rejoice in the decree of reprobation? Are you heartily glad that God will doom your fellow-creatures to endless torments ? Minister. Ah, we have so much natural weakness here, that it is difficult to reconcile ourselves to God's will in many cases. I do not expect to be able, in this imperfect state, to contemplate the damnation of the impenitent with complacency : but heaven is a perfect state ; there, I do suppose, I shall be able to say : Amen to every exhibition of God'srighteous judgments. Univer- nalist. Do you not think that Satan has pleasure in the torments of sinful men in hell? Minister. Yes, certainly. Uniiersalist. The amount of the matter then, is — i\vB.tnow you are not quite as perfect as the devil ; but hope when you get to heaven to be as good as he is ! Ibid. A very celebrated divine was in the habit of preaching so as to be rather beyond the comprehension of his hearers — A lady of his parish met him one day and asked him what the duty of a shepherd was — "To feed his flock, of course,'' was the reply. "Ought he then, to place the hag so high that but few of the sheep can reach it ?'' — Ibid. REVIEWS. " The Three Grand Exhibitions of Man's Enmitij to God." By David Thom, D.D., Pii. D. Bold Street Chapel, Liverpool. — London : H. K. Lewis, 15, Gower Street, North; Liverpool, George Phillip. 1845. Divinity is unquestionably the most lofty and sublime subject tliat can engage the attention of a thinking mind ; at the same time , like all other high and lofty things, most difKcuIt to handle properly, as the mass of incon- sistent, incongruous, contradictory nonsense, dignified with the name of Divinity, the press daily teems with, proves. From this charge of inconsis- tency, &c. v/c mustexcept Thom's "Three (Jrand Exhibitions of Man's Enmity to God ." — And seldom as wc take up the pen of the criiic, we cannot now re- REVIEWS. 219^ frain from making some comments on tliis most masterly production, and bearinj^ some testimony of our higli estimation and admiration of it, in the hope that it may be the means of causing a work so deserving of an attentive perusal to be more generally known and read. — We have long considered Dr. Thorn the most original and consistent writer on theology it has been our lot to become acquainted with ; and much instruction, and great consolation, especially in tlie hour of affliction, have we derived from his previous works, particularly from his "Assurance of Faitli" and " Divine Inversion.'' — Many writers on divinity, are very logical, and occasionally, or to a certain extent, scriptural, but then their arguments are based on such false and erroneous pre- mises, i. e. on such false and erroneous views of Holy Writ, that their writings are altogether inconclusive and unconvincing ; yea, little better than a heterogeneous mass of contradictions. Whereas Dr. Thom's great excellence and superiority lies in the soundness and consistency of his arguments and the deep scriptural knowledge he brings forward to prove them. Perhaps, in the work under review, a close argumentative style, is not so continuously kept up as in the "Assurance of Faith,'' which last work, is certainly strictly argumen- tative throughout. The '' Exhibitions of Human Enmity,'' consisting more of assertions, is the result of a deep and close study of the Scriptures, which study has evidently been carried on by a mind of no common order, and of one spiritually enlightened from above to an enviable degree. The plan of the work brings the subject before the mind of the reader, in a most lucid systematic manner, and shows the author has taken a very clear, comprehensive view of it, before, we should sav, he had written a sentence. As the title asserts, there are three grand exibitionsof man's enmity to God. 1st. Violation of the Divine Prohibition. '2nd. Disobedience to the Divine Command. 3rd. Denial of Divinely revealed Fact. The first, as every tyro in Scripture knows, was the transgression of our first parents in paradise. The state of primeval innocence, however long or short it might be. Dr. Thorn considers, or rather asserts, was miraculous and souUcal, but not in any degree spiritual; and says, page 27 : " They know nothing of the distinction or rather opposition subsisting between soul and spirit. This distinction is expressly laid in 1 Cor. xv. 45. ' The first man Adam was made made a living sow/; the last Adam a quickening spirit.' No matter that man- kind in general, nominal Christians no less than heathens, liave chosen to iden- tify soul and spirit ; it is enough for us who respect and love the divine testi- mony, that the Holy Ghost hath seen meet to distinguish them. Soiil, we learn, from this highest of ail anthoi-ities, speaking in the passage just quoted is illustrated and confirmed by the context, verses 46 — 49, is the mind of Adam the creature, a being of the earth, earthy ; spirit is this mind of the Lord Jesus, the Creator, not as he apjjcared in flesh, but as glorified by being exalted to his heavenly throne. This distinction plainly as it is revealed, is generally, over- looked, if not denied. Hence pure soul, or Adam's earthly mind as it existed in paradise before the fall, is almost universally confounded with spirit or Christ's divine mind — the principles of which He became possessed or rather invested ■with which He was manifested subsequently to His resurrection and ascension." By the way, this impUes the Lord Jesus had not the Spirit till after Hia resurrection, and yet does not Scriptui-e assert He, at his baptism, " saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him, and also that in him dwelt the Spirit without meastue?'' But to return. Page 30, Dr. Thorn says: — "The fact is, what soul is to Spirit, the earthly paradise was to the heavenly one. Adam the temporary possessor of soul, the passive recij)ient, •^'v^n Z,uiita, stood to Jesus the ever- lasting possessor and active bestower of Spirit, ■jrvivf/.a. Z,uo'7roiouv, in the relation of shadow to substance. The pure soulical state of the former was in every respect a beautiful emblem of the spiritual state of the latter; but it was nothing more. Just as the earthly paradise was in every 220 REVIEWS. respect Uie shadow of the heavenly one, but it was nothing more either AU this fleshly religionists know nothing about. And hence the ^ross absurdity chargeable on the views of all of them, when treating of the earthly paradisaical state ; they ascribe to it and to its enjoynients spiritual properties, properties, wiiich as substantial belong, and can only belong to its heavenly antitype, the paradise of God.'' Here Dr. 'I'honi adds this clever note : — "A similar mistake is committed by vast numbers in respect to Eph. iv. 24 ; They ascribe to Adam in paradise the knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness of which the Ajiostle there speaks, supposing that the renewed ones become by grace what he originally was. Wiiereas the Apostle is there illiptically contrasting the ignorance, sin- fulness, and false holiness of the old man, Adam, the shadow, as he existed in paradise, with the knowledge, righte )usness, and true holiness of the new man Jesus, tlie substance, as he reigns glorified at God's right hand. Adam possessed a shadowi/ knowledge, a shadowi/ righteousne.ss, and a shadowy holiness, until he transgressed ; in Jesus we have conferred upon us the substance of all these qualities. Holiness of the truth or substance, opace must make a few sentences suffice. "As then, the Isracllio in th'-ir journey from Egypt luul been made to wander REVIEWS, 2S5 forty years in the wildcrnpss of Arabia, until a then existing generatiou had pa-^seii away, before they entered into Canaan ; so were the true Israelites, consisting of believinsr Jews and Gentiles, in their journey from the mystical Egypt of the Mosaic rifes and institutions. Rev. xi. 8, made to continue forty years in the wilderness of a reconciled state, subject to the law of faith, until the whole generation of unbelievers had been cut off before entering into the heavenly Canaan of a saved state, or that enjoyment of rest from subjection to law in \.he glorified Messiah, which, from the foundation of the world, had awaited the people of God. Heb. iv. 9. See Psalm xcv. 6 — 11. Rom. V. 10. Rev. xiv. 13. At the close of these forty years, the second divine experiment upon man vras complete. His enmity to God, exhibited in the shape of disobedience to the law of command, was thoroughly manifested. Nothing more, with reference to this point, remained to be done. Besides, divine law, iu addition to its having answered the purposes of afFording mere man an opportunity to display his enmity to God, had been obeyed by Christ, and as the law of faith by his people, under the influence cf his holy and heavenly spirit. Law, therefore, as fulfilled in every respect, passed away. With the ending of law closed likewise the exercise of the apostolic ministry, as having been subservient to the promulgation and • enforcement of the law of faith : in connexion with this event, the church having been elevated into the heavenly and saved stite, and the Jews, no longer the favourite church and people of God, having been punished with destruction of their city and temple and with deprivation of their privileges by the instrumentality of Titus. Ex- pulsion from paradise had followed the sin of Adam : expulsion from their earthly church state and capacity, as well as coming short of a higher state and privileges, followed the sin, the second sin, of the Jews. And thus ended the second, or partly miraculous and partly non-miraculous ttnuv age or sera of the world." P. 1G9, 170. (To he concluded in our next.) A Bsrpmis Strictures on a Maiimcrlpt, entitled, The puni.'ihmenl of the wicked pvprlastiini ; and Dialogues betiveen a Calvinist, Arminia», and Berean. By John Oakeshott. Second Edition. London H. K. Lewis, 15, Gower Street, North. 1850. Our friend, Mr. Oakeshott, has long been favourably known among F-van- gelical Universalists, as a man of talents, education, and piety. Several tracts have, in the course of the last few years, emanated from his pen, all alike creditable to himself, and serviceable to the cause of heavenly truth and love. The work to which we are at present directing attention, consists of " Strictures" written in answer to objections made against a former publication of Mr. Oakeshott, entitled, "Second Reply,'' &c. and of " Dialogues on the doc- trine of endless punishment." These two tracts are preceded by a brief, but beautifully written, interesting and Christian preface. Ever since our author's naoie and productions were first brought under our notice, we have been struck with his character as a man, anb his style as a writer. Simple, affectionate, Christianlike, and yet powerful is he. in both re- spects. Truth is his grand object; and by a sincere regard to what he conceives to be truth, is he cons.antly actuated. ' Almost as a necessary consequenc of this singleness of aim his compositions are clear and perspicuous. Tlu-ough a style which may be fitly denominated transparent, sweet and spiritual ideas con- tinually shine forth. "We read his various productions with ease and pleasure. We find that we comprehend them at every step ; and we lay them down with the conviction, that we have been travelling for a while in company with an humble and devoted follower of the Lord Jesus, to whose language and sugges- tions we have been indebted for no small degree of edification. As a logician, Mr. Oakeshott stands high. He assails the strongholds of error, anddemolishes them with great ease. But his exposure of falsehood, although most masterly, is couched in a style of gentleness, and breathes a spirit of affection which positively disarms controversy of all that is harsh and offensive. Deiiuhted have we been to renew our acquaintance with the author, through the medium of the present little volume. We find it characterised by all the excellences observable in his other productions. It is sweet, pleasing, and instructive. He has had to do with bitter, and, judging from allusions and quotations, with not particularly scrupulous adversaries. Their errors he han- voL. n. 2 I 22G REVIEW*. tiles severely, but spares their persons. God's universal love he has vindicated from aspersions and misrepresentations ; but its maligners are borne with, the kindest and justest reasons are assigned for their mistakes, and every effort is made lo prevail on them to institute a new and rigorous examination of the Scriptures with reference to the sTibject, as well as to reconsider that sentence of condemnation to which under the influence of ignorance and prejudice they have already come. The " Strictures on the" Sermon or " Manuscript,'' occupy twelve tolerably closely j-.rinted Octavo pages. Each proposition of the author of the animad- versions, is taken up and considered success! vel}'. Especially, his repetition of the common and well-known charge brouglit against Universalists, of con- cin-ring with the Serpent, in his delusive language to Eve and her husband: ye xJialt vof sioelij die. Gen. iii. 4. Tiiis is admirably retorted. Partialists by ascribing immortality to man in his original,* and still more in his fallen state, — ^in flat contradiction to scripture which represents man, after thefall, as ex- cluded from eating oi the tree of life in order to prevent his becoming immortal as a sinfid l)eing, Gen. iii. 22 — 24, and which ascribes our possession of life and immortality to our being made partakers of the divine nature through the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, 1 Cor. xv. 21, 22, 49, &c. — are easily and satisfactorily shewn by our autlior to be the very parties who, however inicnnsciously and unintentionally, have adopted the serpent's language, and are enfoixing the Serpent's falsehood. f There is, perhaps, nothing very original in our friend's " Strictures.'' But they are sensible, impressive, and exceedingly well-written. Mr. Oakeshott's "Dialogues'' are composed in the same simple, amiable, and Christian spirit. While their statements are in the main scriptural, and their reasonings cogent and convincing, we are not annoyed by anything like petu- lance, or by unseemly exhibitions of temper. Throughoijt we breathe an at- mospliere of love. Truth is not sacrificed ; nay, its claims are strenuously and rigidly enforced : but it is evidently one object of our author to afford an ex- ample of tlie tenderness, forbearance, and mutual affection, with which follow- ers of the Lamb, disagreeing on certain points, shoidd conduct their opposition to one another. Edification we experience to be the result of a perusal of these conversations. Except in the First Dialogue, where the discussion is carried on by a Cal- vinist, an Arminian, and a Berean, (not in tlie sense of a follower of John Barclay,) these parties, with the addition of a Baxterian, constitute the inter- locutors. Mr. (Jake.shott's idea evidently is, to have all the leading religious parties represented in this imaginary conference. And so they are. Each ex- ])resses himself according to the notions of his sect; that is, in the statements and objections of eacli, the current and approved sentiments of his party are enibf)died. Our author's o])ponents propound their several objections freely. He himself, in the person of Berean, re])lies to them. Baxteiian is ultimately convinced. And the others retire from the discussion, with an acknowledg- ment of deep and frivotirable impressions having been made upon their minds: — '■' Calvinus. I confess my mind is greatly shaken. I cannot refute what I have heard ; and this conversation will have my serious consideration. Arminius. I am desirous to acknowledge with thanks the instruction I have received from otn- brother; and, like Calvinus, admit our present discussion has made a great impression on ni)' mind, and will have my deliberate and prayerful consideration." p. G3. * Adam's oriRinal life was not immortal or infinite in heaven, but meTelycdcpable of indefinitely prolonjjed continuance upon eartli, in the event of trans^tression not intervening. t The fale of the human race, through sin, is death or destruction : death of mind, and death of body. Human nature, as such, never lives again. Having died really and substantially in Christ's death as human beings, we live again, through tlie power of his resurrection, as new- creatures, orbeing.s possessed of the divine nature. See Kom. vi. 3, 4, Gal. ii. 20, 1 Cor. xv. 49, Eph iv. 2, Cor. v. 17. We, therefore, as partakers of Adam's nature, surely die. To live for ever as human beings, would be certainly to convert Satan, the father of lies, into the prophet tf truth. . . RSTIEWS. 22t Like some other brethren beloved, whose productions we ha^e had occasion to notice, Mr. Oakeshott combines the millennial theory upon which we have more than once animadverted, with his Universalism. In the work now under review, as well as in his other able tracts, we find him contending for this par- ticuhu- view of the subject. One is struck in reading the " Strictures," and " Dialogues," at our friend's manifest familiarity with some of the best and ablest writers of the Universa- list School. Besides the treatises of Elhanan Winchester, he appears to have carefully studied, and to have made himself thoroughly acquainted with that master-piece of erudition, in behalf of the doctrine of God's Universal love, Stonehouse's " Restitution of all things.'' Earnestly do we desire to see this work republished. As a specimen of learning and scriptural criticism, on tha: side of the Universalist controversy which we have deliberately and conscien- tiously espoused, it has no equal ; and to refute by means of revelation, its leading statement, we have no hesitation in pronouncing to be impossible- D. T. The Acts of the Elders, commoitly called the Book of Abraham ; containing a revelation made to hiin at a protracted meeting. To which is appended a chapter from the Book of religions errors. With notes of explanation and commentation from commencement to termination. Calculated for the meri- dian of Rhode Islaiid, but will answer for the New England States. Writ- ten by himself. [Abraham Norwood.] Providence, R. I. Published for the purchaser. 1842. Also same work, new and revised edition, with title page slightly altered, and second preface, Boston, Mass. 1846. Such of our readers, as have completed fifty years of their earthly existence^ and have been in the habit of scanning the pages of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine from its commencement, may chance to recollect the appearance in that periodical, between thirty and thirty five years ago, of a certain article eclyped, " a Chaldee manuscript." They may also remember, the mighty stir in the religious world, and especially in Scotland, of wliich its appearance was productive. It was written in the style of sacred scripture. This, combined with the topics of which it treated, and the manner of treating them, gave great off'ence. So much so, indeed, that the proprietor of the magazine sustained, in consequerce of its a[)pearance considerable pecuniary injury. Nothing of the kind, so far as we are aware, has since been attempted. And instructions, it is imderstood, were extensively given to binders, in the event of copies of the magazine beiii^ brought to them, to substitute tor the number containing the obnoxious "Manuscript," another from which it had been withdrawn, and replaced by matter of a totally different description.* Our Transatlantic friends are not quite so squeamish, in this respect, as we are. Books written in scripture style are not vnicommon in the United States of America. We might even sav, are by many regarded with a favourable eye.f If we are not greatly mistaken, at least one work, a history of the great revolutionary war, 1775 — 1783, composed in scripture phraseology, and divided into chapters and verses, which we remember liaving seen, citlier is, or was used in several schools as a class-book. Two or three other American books, of a similar kind, have come under our notice. Upon the propriety, or im- propriety, of works so composed, we at ])resent pronounce no opinion. We content ourselves with merely recording tlie above facts. "The Acts of the Elders, " which professes to be a portion of the personal liistory of Mr. Abraham Norwood, its author, now the Universalist minister at Salisbury, Massachusetts, thus opens :— * "The Ecoiiomyof human life,'' ('Dodsley's,) and some other British publications of a similar kind, might be supposed to have prepared our countrymen, to look upon treatises, or articles composed in this style, if not with approbation, at all events with forbearance. What happened, however, on the occasion referred to in the text, was calculated to undeceive iis. + Who knows not Franklin's cclebraturl, and oft-rcprintcri apologue of Abraham and t)ic Stranger who came to his tent .' 228 REVIEWS. CHAP. I. 1. Now it came to pass that Harrison was dead, and Tyler was made President in his stead over all the United States of America. 2. And political dissensions ceased in some good degree for a while, that the people misrht manifest their grief for him who had been elected Chief Magistrate of the nation, and had been cut off by death. 3.*r About this time there was in the town of Warwick, in the land of Roger Williams, [Rhode Island] asmall number of pious people, who had renounced the vain traditions of men ; 4. And they gave heed only unto the word of the Lord, and bound themselves together by a covenant to support the truth, as revealed by Jesus and his Apostles, and prophesied by all God's holy prophets, since the \%orld besran. 5. Then said they one to another. Behold we have no one to go in and out before us from Sabbath to Sabbath, and to break unto us the bread of life ; 6. Let us, therefore, send for one Abraham, river, even by Fall River, in the old Bay State. [Massachusetts.] 7. Peradventure he may come unto us, al- though we are few in number, and poor in worldly goods, for we have heard that he is of a lowly and devoted spirit, and unambitious in the things of the world. 8. So they sent a messenger unto Abraham, saying. We pray thee, come over and help us, and we will strive to do good both to thee and to thine. 9. IF Then Abraham when he liad diligently inquired of the Lord touching this matter, said; I will go. 10. Accordingly, he arose and went, he, and his wife, and the little ones which God had given them — and they journeyed to the land whither they had been invited. 1 1 . Howbeit, his wife, whose name was Ruth, and his kindred, and many friends were not pleased that he should depart out of the State [Massachusetts] in which he had been nourish- ed and brought up. an Elder, whose present abode is by a certain We should like to have been able to insert the whole of'lNIr. Norwood's two prefaces. They are exceedingly characteristic. Humorous, patiietic, pungent, and straightforward. Also, redolent of genius. 'J'he second jireface, which professes to be the result of the deliberations of a meeting " liolden in Pro- prietors' Hall" composed of "Abraham himself, the Recorder of the Acts of tlie Elders, the Publishtr of the said work, the writer of the Notes of expla- nation, an elder from the State of Rhode Island, a clergyman of .Massachusetts, and all others personally, particularly and pecuniarily interested iri the publica- tion of the above-named Book," that is, of himself alone as sustaining ail these different characters, is written in a siyle of humour, and has about it a point, not luiworthy of the author of the " Tale of a Tub'' himself. But the length of the two articles, and the extremelj' narrow limits to which we are obliged to restrict ourselves, forbid our copying tliem. Similar reasons prevent our entering at an)' length on the consideration of this very amusing, no less than instructive performance itself. Such of our friends as can procure it — which may be done through our publisher — will deem themselves amply repaid by a perusal, A few passages, however, as illustrative of the turn of mind of the author, and of the general character of the work, it may not be amiss to quote. CHAP. vir. 7 ^ Then arose a man of Harrisville, who professed to have done much in time past, for the cause of universal grace. 8. But he now denounced that doctrine as the veriest falsehood, and repented that he had done aught for its promotion. 9. Then said Abraham within himself, Fear not ; for thou shalt surely be forgiven. 10. It requireth but asmall particle of for- giveness to pardon all that thou hast done for this cause, even if it is, as thou sayest the cause of the evil one 11. For at the most thou hast done but little ; nnd if thy other sins are of no greater magni- tude, thcu mayest rest in peace. 28. Then Baker prayed vehemently about Abraham and his daninable heresy: and as he prayed, he said, 2'J. 6 Lord God ! let not that man speak, who halh come in hither to night, to scatter fire-brands, arrows and death in this congrega- tion. at). 1[ But Baker continued his prayer, say- ing, O Lord, God! let him not speak! Let us have a Ions .season of prayer. 37. Help some one to follow immediately! And help somebody elsi to follow him! .'JH. % And as he prayed furiously that Abra- ham might be smitten down, and his nmuth stopped, h» occasionally unclosed an eye. 39. And looked forth to see if his prayer was answ ered ; and tlius did he watch as well as pray. CHAP. VIIL 5. Now prayed the Elders, and then the laymen prayed; and now prayed the laymen, and then the Elders prayed ; 0. And there was mingled amid the various sounds, the crying, half-smothered, drawling voice of one of the simple women, not a widow, who freely cast in her mite, to assist in this try- time. 7. And the Lord was told, that Abraham was a bad man, and a hypocrite — that he was going to hell himself, and not satisfied with this, was striving to deceive and lead others there also. 8. But the Lord believed not the words which were spoken ; and even Abraham knew that they were utterly false, and instigated by the father of lies 23. Then a new voice fell upon the ear, and new courage was inspired; and after astrange commingling of discordant sounds, which har- monized like unto the music of a .saw mill and a grinds-tone, the hymn was finished which commenceth thus : Come, Holy Spirit, heaven- ly Dove ! 24. This was precisely suited to the case; for as the Holy Spirit was far away, it was proper they should sing tor it to come. How- ever it caine not. REVIEWS. 229 29. And liad fixed his attention upon the glasses that were about his eyes, he was quite amused; and taking them from their resting place, he carefully wiped the dust therefrom, saying, 30. Poor Spectacles! Thou hast indeed, though innocent, come in for a share of the bitter reproach heaped without measure upon thine owner. 31. In time past, thou hast faithfully shield- ed mine eyes from (lust, and in time present, thou dost nobly remain in the fore-front of the hottest battle, &c. 25. I don't care how many spectacles, or glasses, a man may wear, to give him an ap- pearance, if he has not the truth of God in his heart. 26. ^ Now it was so, that the eyesight of Abraham had become dim, by reason of sick- ness in years past, and he therefore suffered a pair of spectacles to rest upon his nose; 27. That he might the more easily look straight before him, and ponder the paths of his feet — for he chose light and not darkness. 28 And when he saw that his adversary had become weary with denying his doctrine, and his Christian character. Truly, Mr. Norwood's adversaries might well admit, that " he was a man of talents.'' The poor Massachusetts ex-fislierman has probably no great store of liuman learning. But as a man of genius, we doubt much if his equal is to be found among his Universalist brethren. How quaintly original is he ! His humour is most exquisite, as well as most natural. We might almost be justi- fied in styling him, the American Rabelais. Sweet, however, is his spirit. With a keen sense of tiie ridiculous in liuman character and conduct, he com- bines the greatest tenderness for Inmian fully and frailty. P^ools are perfectly safe in his hands. A good-natured smile accompanied, perhaps, with a playful ])at, is tlie utmost that in general they provoke from him. And he is constantly on his guard against the indulgence of buffoonery. Good sense and Christian feeling, on the part of our friend, nuist have spared many an imbecile and many a malicious assailant the infliction of well-merited stripes which, had they been allowed to descend, would have left behind them their marks for many a long day. What a blessing is it, when humour like that of Mr. Nor- wood, is associated with good temper! Ilow happens it, that, without having been Academically trained, and without having devoted himself exclusively to literary jnirsuits, Mr. Norwood should compose in so pure, correct, and thoroughly-idiomatic an English style? Is it that the people of New England have had our language trans- mitted to them from their Puritan fathers, in a more perfect state, than we ourselves have received it ? Is it that the working classes among them, are better educated than ours are, and read more than ours do ? Is it that their familiar acquaintance with our excellent translation of the Scriptures, while it has been the means ot di>closing to them its beauties, has served also to impart to them a relish for its Saxon phraseology? Whatever may be the cause, we have more than once been struck with the terse, quaint, and truly idiomatic turn of expression, apparent in even the ordinary and comparatively uneducated writers of the Northern States of the Union. In respect of correct and racy English composition Mr. Norwootl scarcely yields to Cobbett himself. Independently altogether of the originality, genius, and shrewdness of observation which it displays, and viewed with reference to its diction alone, we have no hesitation in sajing, that considerable literary reputations have been built upon slenderer foundations, than are laid in the style adopted, and the language employed throughout " The Acts of the Elders." Abraham Norwood's story, which is in some measure the subject-matter of bis work, is soon told. He had been born, and had for many years in early life been employed as a fislierman at Cape Aim, in the State of Massachusetts. There, having been called to the knowledge of God's Universal Love, he represents himself as having, like Peter and John, "forsaken his nets and his boats — and become a fisher of men, according to the word of the Lord.'' Chapter i, verse 32. Great opposition he encountered. But having an undaunted spirit, and perfect con- fidence in the truth of what he was engaged in proclaiming, he persevered, and continues persevering, in spite of all tne virulence and ill-usage, to which he has been and still is exposed, in the prosecution of his sacred calling. After having spent a considerable time at Warwick, in Rhode Island, he has 230 REVIEWS. DOW for several years been located at Salisbury, in Massacliusetts; if located be a proper term to apply to one, whose lite and exertions have for a long period of time been almost entirely missionary. Singular is the book now befjie us, and singular has been its fate. Singular as we have seen, is it in style and phraseology. And not less so, in its contents. We have accounts ot the prevalence of Universali.it doctrine, in Rhode Island, under Abraham's ministry — of the amioyance thereby caused to the Baptists and Methodists — and of the confederacy into which these lival sects entered to wage war with Abraham and his party. We have abstracts of sermons preached, and of devotional exercises engaged in against Abraham — relations of his feelings while listening to them — and comments upon them. Also of Abraham's attempts at self-defence, and of the shoutings, prayeis, ex- hortations, singing of hymns, and other manoevres, by which iiis adversaries contrived to drown his voice, and have things their own way. His own dodge in substituting a benev'olent prayer, for an anticipated speech, is told with great beauty, and inimitable humour. Nothing indeed, can be conceived more racy and comical, as well as graphic and original, than our aufhor's account of the scenes in which he bore a part. He lets us, in a few pages into all the arcana and machinery of " a protracted meeting."* However olijectionable on many grounds, an imitation by human writers of the style of scripture may be, it cannot be denied, that scarcely ever has a more able and powerful production, couched in this style, issued from the press. Pity 'tis, tliat the local and ephemeral character of the topics of wiiich it treats should tend to diminish its interest, and interfere with its spread and notoriety. Yet we are not altogether justified in expressing ourselves thus despondingly, for Singular has been the fate of the book. Instead of having been like many other clever productions, consigned to oblivion, after having served its imme- diate purpose, it actually exhibits symptoms of something like permainent vitality. So great arid increasing as been the demand for it, that several years ago, Mr. Norwood had it stereotyped, and it has already, if we mistake not, been disposed of to the extent of some eight or ten thousand copies. Its quaint humour, and plain palpable manner of enunciating truth, the countrymen of its author have not been slow to appreciate. Works of far higlier pretension on the subject of God's universal love will, it is probable after the lapse of a few years be forgotten. His own prose account, in another work, of the ditii- culties and disputes in which his profession of Universalisni involved him, and the ecclesiastical discipline to which he was subjected, although very ably written, is probably now known to but few, and cared about by still fewer. But his "Acts ot tbe Klders," from its style, its genius, its quiet pungent humour, its occasional sweet pathos, its condensed and telling statements of divine truth, its amazing power, and, above all, its Christian spirit, is likely to continue in request and to be admired, long after its author, and the generation which first siiw it pubhshed, shall have been consigned to the dust. I). T. Nine Letters between A. G. M. [Andrew Geouge Moller] and N. B., a letter to the Rev. Hu(jh M'Ncile, of Lloerpool, and another ; with aupendix and notes. Dublin: Samuel Machen, 28, Westmoreland Street, 1^49. Rare is the combination of great talents with piety, and of extensive and varied learning with evangelical views, and an experience of the humbling ten- dencies and influence of the gospel. When, however, it does occur, how lovely, and how cnptivating is it felt to be! A Cowper may stand almost alone, as at once evangelical, and a true poet. Ihit high mental qualities may manifest theniselves in other forms, hesides that of poetry. Pleased are we, through the medium of the pamplilet whose title heads this • A species of rcrJun/is/w, got up l)y the American Uai)tists, in iniitaticin of their lival";, the Wesleyan Mcthodiitb. UK VIEWS. 231 article, to have an opportunity of drawing attention to the character, talents, and attainments of its publisher, Mr. Moller. Long have we known,* and much do we admire this gentleman. His belief in the doctrine of God's Uni- versal love dates some years prior to our own f To his conversations on the subject, at a time when difficulties connected with it, which we found ourselves imable to surmount beset our path, we acknowledge ourselves to owe much. Honestly did he express himself. And yet, humbly and cautiously. He had read several of the best works written in favour of Universalism. One of these Stoneliouse's unnnswerable treatise, he had actually been at the pains of copy- ing, from beginning to end, with his own hand. For the gift of his manuscript, and thus, for the opportunity of becoming acquainted witn this masterly pro- duction, we are indebted to Mr, MoUer's kindness. J We take leave to mention, that the " Nine letters,'' is far from beino-, the first of Mr. Moller's publications. Above twenty years ago, he translated into English, in an able and most scholarlike manner, and brought out, Le C'lerc's celebrated, Sentimens de quelques llieologians de Hullamle, siir I'histoirp critique du Vieux Tvstamcnf, composee pnr le Pere Richard Simon de VOrafoire. Amsterdam, 1685. This is one of the few works which we have had an oppor- tunity of perusing both in the original, and in the translation. Mr. Moller's part, we can with truth say, is admirably executed. No one can peruse the notes with which he has enriched his version, witliout instruction, and without wondering at the range and maturity of the learning which they displa\'. The fact is our friend possesses eminent qualifications as an author, and es- pecially as an author on Christian and Biblical topics. Endowed with supe- rior natural abilities, he has been highly educated in the best sense of the term. As an alumima of the Ihiiver.^ities of IJublin and Edmburgh, (at the latter of which, his studies were principally medical,) he was not undistinguished. Besides other acquisitions, derived from a course of reading which has been varied and extensive, few of his contemporaries are better acquainted than he is, with the writings of those who are commonly denominated the Fathers of the Christian Church. And with many of the most eminent Continental au- thors, of modern times, he is familiar. To composition, he has long habituated himself. A strong savour, indicative alike of the scholar and the gentleman is perceptible in all that has issued from his pen. Earnestly do we wish, that we could have expressed acquiescence, in all respects, in the sentiments of our excellent and highly respected friend. But alas! this may not be. Whether as the descendant of German ancestors, or as having been educated in the theological school of the keen, critical, and specu- lative John Walker, with whose body he was atone time closely connected or on other accounts, his turn of mind, which is singularly and powerfully ratioci- native, has led him to question the canonicityof several of the books of the New Testament Scriptures.^ Especiall}', of the Apocalypse. Its divine origin, and inspired authority, with Oeder, Semler, and others, he unhesita- tingly and even scornfully rejects.§ To us, this opinion of Mr. Moller's has been most painful, and to our readers the occaasion of a positive loss. For it has occasioned the exclusion of some otherwise most valuable papers of that gentleman's, from the cnlumns of the " Universalist." Honoured on the score of their scholarship, and benefited by their evangelical sentiments, we should liave been in the event of their insertion; but much as we admire our friend's talents, respect his honesty, and have been edified by his piety, the editor could * About 23 or 24 years. t He became a Universalist about 1825. X We have since, with some difficulty, procured a printed copy of the book. IT Those known in the early age of the Church as the avriXiyof^iva.. § Mr. Moller informs us. in one of his notes in the pamphlet now underreview that Oedcr's " Christian Free Inquiry concerning the so-called Revelation of John," he has translated, along- with Semler's notes and preface, having added to these about one hundred nctes of liis own With a perusal of this able work, and equally able translation, in MS, we have been honoured by the translator. 232 REVIEWS. not persuade liimself to open our pan;es to a controversy, whicli over and above its being aside from tlie purpose of our periodical, is, it appears to us, uncalled for by the circumstances of the case, as well as calculated to unsettle the minds of weak and ill-informed believers of the truth. We deeply regret, for the sake of our readers, uie loss of Mr. MoUer's valuable assistance, which adherence to a ride imposed on ourselves when we entered on this undertaking, has necessarily occasioned. As to the pamphlet now lying before us, we can unhesitatingly affirm, that it well deserves, and will abundantly repay the perusal of the scholar and the Christian. It is controversial. But on the part of Mr. Moller, it is controversy conducted on the best principles, and in the best spirit. Of the "Nine Letters," five are Mr. Moller's ; and these are by far the longest, as they are also by far the most instructive and interesting, in the collection. In one of his opponent's epistles, (letter iv. p. 10,) be is complimented, and complimented most justly, on the " acuteness, learning, and research" which he has displayed. These qualities characterize and pervade everyone of our friend's compositions Whether it be to expose the trickery of the Romish priesthood — to shew the meaning of anointing with oil, and other miraculous observances in the primi- tive churches — to trace the history of the Canon of Scripture — or to state the glorious gospel in its simplicit}- — Mr. Moller is aiways and equally at home. Clear and impressive is he in his remarks, and felicitous in his quotations Ready to shatter to atoms the paralogisms, and erroneous criticisms of his an- tagonists. Careful has he been in the perusal of the various works to which he has occasion to refer — fidly master of their contents and meaning: dues he evince himself to be — and the "sad ignorance of grammar and of Greek especially in the Latin church, as we see even in Jerome, but especially inRufinus and the other Latin interpreters of Origen,'' (Letter, p. 9,) must, we suspect, have been imfm-mation, as it could scarcely have failed to be somewhat annoying to his Popish Correspondent. Want of time and space forbids our entering further on the consideration of the valuable and instructive letters which constitute the body of the present tract. This we deeply regret. Every letter of Mr. Moller furnishes materials for profitable reflection and comment. How admirably does be sliew himself to be acquainted with the chief evils of L'ish society, and with that spirit of Popery by which some of the worst of them are fostered and perpetuated. Romish priests find no favour at his hands. The letter to Rev. Hugh, now Dr. M'Neile evincing sympathy with Luther in his views respecting the Epistle of James* — that to Edward O Mahony, Esq, rectifying a mistake — and the Appendix, in which some remarks are made on Robert Fleming's nook on the prophecies, all inerit attention. Concerning the notes, with which the pamphlet is wound up we would observe briefly that rich they are in matter, and most scholar like, although modest and unpretending in manner. Deep is our regret to see such a mass of able criti- cism and well digested learning, condensed and presented in a publication so little likely to be known, and so little calculated to forward the objects of its talented and benevolent author. Would that througii the mediuin of this periodical, we could succeed in drawing some attention to Mr. Moller, his sentiments, and.his works — for not- withstanding the differences subsisting between himself and us — differences, for his view of some of which he can plead no less an authority than that of Luther himsilf — we sincefely respect him, and deem him, on the score of talents, learning, evangelical sentiments, purity of moral character, benevolence, and personal piety, an ornament to ihe cause of Universal Salvation, of which be has for a very long period been the decided and consistent supporter. f D. T. * Episto/ii straminnii. Lutlior. + Were it nnt indelicate, indeed, of the nature of an outrage to a man of retiring habits, and pcruliarly sensitive and modest turn of mind, it would have delighted us to draw veiy i)articular attention to the services which Mr. Moller's knowledge of the medical profession, under the proiiiiitingsof benevolence and Christian feeling, has enabled him to render gratuitously to the HU/I'ering poor. THE UNIYERSALIST. OCTOBER, 1851. AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY EESPECTFULLY AND HUMBLY SUBMITTED TO THE CONSIDERATION OF CHRISTIANS. People speak of the happiness of childhood. I never knew it. Of all the misery my life has known that if my childhood and boyhood was the most hopeless, the most withering. Whether the brain was the cause ; or whether there was some mysterious process of life which drank up my spirits and darkened my soul in its progress I cannot tell ; but whatever may have been the cause the effect was sad enough. It is very lamentable that parents should have the care of children before they know anything ivhatever of their inner life. Everyone un«^ derstands the disastrous consequences of ignorance in parents with re- gard to the physical aspect of childhood, but who thinks of them in the spiritual ? Who knows, or who that has known can recal, or would re- cal, or can paint the darkness and desolation and v.-retcheduess of the child ? For the child cannot describe and is afraid to attempt description. And if it did how many mothers can listen ; how many are qualified to speak ? What could our mothers say ? what would ninety-nine out of every hundred be likely to say? Yet believe me, mothers, it is very necessary you should know how to listen so as to induce your child to try to speak. You should know how to encourage its tears, that the overcharged bosom might be relieved, and then to soothe them. You should be qualified for your awful position for you are in God's stead to your child without doubt. To whom else can a child go ? And if you chide, or laugh at its sorrow as many mothers do ; if you pooh pooh Its perplexities, if you are impatient, you will chill and freeze the genial current which would otherwise in all probability have flowed healthily ; your child's heart may swell in consequence to bursting ; an early death may be and very frequently is the result ; or if life goes on, its stream is poisoned ; the brain in not a few instances takes the matter up and becomes confused with it ; a lunatic asylum and death end the story for the present. This is not fancy. Names and places and dates can be given. And if it were better known how frequently neg- lect of the inner being in childhood, and religious quackery afterwards, destroy both body and soul, so far as we can see, and according to popular judgments attention would svirely be directed to it, and pre- ventive as well as im>proved remedial measures be adopted. In a wild district, between mountain:^!, rocks and streams, and the VOL. 11. - k; 234 AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. solitude which belongs to them, on one side, and a populous manufac- turing village on the other, I first became conscious of myself, and, as every child is, a student of nature. So long as I was left to nature I did very well, for she had wonderful patience and kindness, and her chidings were uniform and on pririciple, w-ithout caprice and without passion. 1 was fond of mountains and they never disappointed nie of my delight. I loved solitude and its soft, low, gentle, soothing voices have lived w-ithin me to this day. I had a passion for mountain streams and their freshness, life, purity and sinritiialitij, I can never since recal without an intense longing, and uncontrollable yearning after them. And the wildness, and freshness, and freedom, and boundlessness of the scenery so worked themselves into my being as to become necessities to me. But nature has many aspects, and many lessons, and varied disci- pline. And men in all their wonderful variety belong to Nature, which is sometimes forgotten. Now this district was very religious and very wicked indeed ; a combination which many will understand. The reli- gion was either Calvinism, or Arminianism, or Wesleyanism, a compound of the two. There was nothing else. The good old rector was a Calvinist, the whole district was deluged with Wesleyanism ; it hung on the steep mountain sides in wild nooks where shepherds had erected their huts for shelter and warmth ; it followed the streams ; in the farm- house, in the hut, in the dwelling of the artizan, in the mansion of the wealthy manufacturer, everywhere was methodism. Jt filled the manu- factory and the school ; in short it filled every thing. I too of course was filled with it, for my parents after their marriage had been " con- verted." We sang, we read, we talked, we prayed Methodism. But I recollect as a child the distress I felt at the incongruity which I could not but perceive between Methodism and the outer world. They did not seem to me to belong to the same system. Our religion always struck me as artificial, as a made up thing, narrow, fragmentary and unnatural. I could not say this at that time for I did not understand my own feelings ; they greatly distressed and alarmed me indeed ; and I was afraid to let them be known. I thought no one was so tormented by the Devil as I was, for all this I considered to be his work. Reader do you know anything of Class Meetings ? If so you will imderstand my situation when I tell you that at a very early age I was taken to them and admitted a member, regularly paying my penny, and duly every quarter being examined by the appointed " travell- ing preacher" when he presented me with "a ticket," for which he received a shilling. This ticket then, young as I was, admit- ted me to the " Lovefeasts " to which I was sometimes permitted to travel several miles. Whatever at first, might be the utility of these meetings, or whatever it may be now in some respects, I am quite cer- tain they are very injurious to children. I was introduced at the Class Meeting to a number of persons, from a dozen to twenty, of all ages and of both sexes, who met, ostensibly to speak to each other about " the common salvation " and their own individual " experience in the things of God," but really to answer a few questions put to each by a person who had been appointed to do this, and therefore styled the " Class T>eader. " I, a little boy, without any previous instraction AN AXJTOBIOGRAPHY. 235 or preparation, never seeing this Class Leader but officially, apart from my parents, for they belonged to other " Classes " was asked the same questions as a rough, ignorant, middle aged man who had been just "converted," and expected to answer them in the same way. Religion was reduced to a very few points, and very narrow dimensions indeed. There was first " the awakening " " the conviction ; " then " the repen- tance " and weeping, and misery, and praying for jiardon and "liber- ty ; " then the delivery, the being "set at liberty," justification; the progress to " sanctification " or "perfection, " which some old, knotted, hffdened sinners after their conversion attained by a bound, being awakened, justified and sanctified or made quite "perfect," free from all sin in thought, word, and deed in the course of a few months, perhaps, if it was the time of" a revival," in as many weeks. The older and more sober members would occasionly look incredulous, sometimes a little shocked when a savage, ignorant butcher who had been the terror of the country for his reckless profanity, and who even at the time would relate Avith an air of satisfaction how frightened mothers used to be lest their children should hear his languge, when such a man rose and told when and how he had been " convinced of his sin and danger," had been "pardoned" and assured, at the time, of his pardon, had joined the Methodists, (though this always happened before the pardon and assurance,) had heard of sanctification and had struggled and prayed for it all night, perhaps, and all day, and this for weeks, and had obtained it, always " in a moment," and always with some accom- panying sign in feeling and emotion. When I speak of a savage ig- norant butcher it is not imagination. I have a very vivid recollection of such a butcher, a tall, ungainly heavy man, whose countenance was really set in vice, whose eyes would have been sufficient to condemn him had he been on his trial. At this man's voice I had, as I well re- member, a secret nervous horror ; for he belched out prayers and praises and accounts of the " dealings of God with his soul" just as he used to belch out oaths. His very manner was profane ; and the way in which he uttered the ever blessed name was, or seemed to me to be blasphemy. He had no modesty (how should he?) no respect, no reverence. He interrupted every one, censured without hesitation what- ever he thought deserving of censure in another, no matter who. And this great monster was — poh pudor I — " sanctified," " made perfect'' ! Yes, he could tell you when it was done, where, and how, and all about it. He seemed to know quite as much about it as its divine author. And the process so far as you would understand it was quite a mechanical one. He had been " justified" he said ; and he spent his time, when the slaughtering was done for the day, at meetings in his neighbourhood where the excitement was kept up. His Sundays in like manner were past in excitement till at length having heard of sanctification so much and so often he began to think of it for himself. Why not ? He saw nothing against it ; and it would have puzzled any one else to say any thing against it on the principle so popular amongst them. He set to work. The way was this. When it came into anyone's head that he ought to be sanctified — that "it was his duty to enjoy this blessing," he commenced privately, or he went to a "prayer meeting," or some sort of " meeting," the choice depending upon himself, and determined 236 THE MEANIXG OF THE WORD HELL, generally by taste or temperament, sometimes by accident. Either ■way, he must pray till he got it. He must " ^vrestle" like Jacob, he must " struggle," he must " agonize." It was always, or generally very hard work. But to be successful a man must be unwearied and invincible. And when God was, like the unjust steward, " wearied" he gave way, and the " violent" and noisy applicant carried away " the blessing" " by force." This process in truth was so common as to con- stitute the rule, and those peisons who professed " sanctification" were generally persons who had obtained it in this way. And in this way the butcher who had been notorious as "a fighter" before his c^- version, fought his way to the possession of sanctification. To be continued. DOES THE WORD HELL IN THE OLD TESTAMENT MEAN A PLACE OR STATE OF ENDLESS SUFFERING? The Rev. Theodore Clapp, D.D. of New Orleans, an eminent and faithful advocate of the world's salvation* has published the following correspondence in the " Picayune" of that City. Gentlemen, — Will you allow me through the medium of your valua- ble paper, to address the religious community of New Orleans a few observations concerning some strictures on my views of the Bible from the pen of Mr. Twichell, which appeared in the " Delta" last Sunday morning. These criticisms M^ere first published in the same paper about two years ago. Their incorrectness was then shown in an article which was inserted in the Picayune — I am desirous that those interested in this subject should not be misled by any erroneous state- ments about the original scriptures. Now my statement is, that the tvord Hell, in the sense of a place of endless fnnishment for the iviched does not occur once in all the Hebrew Old Testament. This position Mr. Twichell would have his readers to believe, is untrue. Now, since the gentleman is familiar with oriental literature, he will oblige the sceptical by pointing out the chapter and verse of the original where the term above mentioned can be found. 1 have read my Hebrew Bible eyery day for thirty years (when at home and in health) with the help of an excellent dictionary, I cannot find therein the phrase in question. I believe any Hebrew scholar living can testify to the same experience. There are two gentlemen of the .Jewish faith now in this city who are probably better acquainted with Hebrew literature than any Christian minister in the United States. Mr. Leeser, of Philadelphia, and Mr. Nathan, recently called to pre- side over the new synagogue in Canal Street. I am permitted to pub- lish the following note, which they were so kind as to address to me this morning. *' Dear Sir — As far as my knowledge cf our Scriplure extends, I know of no term which is at al! equivalent to tlie linglish wovcl Jlrll, ;iltlioiigh I have so rendered ihe word " S'/ieol" in Psalm xvi. in the edition of the prayer hook of our cliurch ; I did so hecause I could lind no otlicr word wliich more nearly expresses it; but it would be lolly to assume that Sheol meant unconditional and hopeless and everlasting punishment — The term at best is indefinite, and so is tjie word /fell, as in itself it surely can have no such widespread meaning A STORT OF GRACE. 237 which is merely assigned to it arbitrarily by theologians, and if we carefully scan the verse, " For thou will not abandon my soul to hell, neither wilt thou suffer thy pious servant to see conniption ;" and take this as a correct rendering of the Hebrew, or as near as we can come to it, it thus means, tliat though for a time punished for some cause or the other, the abandoning could not be final and that the residence in Slieol should not be degenerated into Shachet " or corruption. Respectfully \ouis, "Rev. Theo. Clapp. Isaac Leeser."' " I fully concur with the explanation given above by the Rev. Mr. Leeser.'' "Rev. Theo. Clapp. M N. Nathan." ^ . UNIVERSALISM IN LIVERPOOL. The Chapel in which for many years the Christians believing and avowino- the doctrine of God's sovereign and unlimited love in Liverpool have been wont to ■worship is now closed. The building in course of erection will, we believe, be completed during the present month. We understand that a sum of about £400 is still required to cover the cost of the new structure. Our friends at Liver- pool \o\e iuntice as well as nurcij, and like all honest people are anxious to be free from debt; gratified should we be to know that their object — the openin<» the new chapel unencumbered by debt — is accomplished. Unable to raise the amount themselves, they have appealed to Universalists generally for their co- operation in this good work. When it is known that the present movement of our friends at Liverpool partakes literally of the character of a testimonial of their esteem for their pastor* we are persuaded that the very honest wishes of the Liverpool congregation will be realized. The appeal to Universalists generally is most fitting ; and we doubt not that very many throuo-hout the country who have been edified and benefited by the invaluable writings of Dr. Thorn, will be grateful for this opportunity of testifying their respect for an individual who by his pen as well as his preaching, has for a quarter of a century, in the face of opposition, at all hazards, and at great personal sacri- fice, honestly, consistently, devoutly, and laboriously maintained and defended the cause of Scriptural Universalism. A STORY OF GRACE. ( Continued from page 87.^ CHAP. IV. To the respect in which he was held by his employers George Richard- son was indebted for many kind enquiries after his health made by them during his absence from business, and now he was able to cet about again, they liberally and without solicitation granted him leave of absence that he might visit his friends in the country, and by the change of air regain that strength and vigour which his protracted con- finement had impaired. The offer was gratefully accepted, and George once more found himself under the parental roof where he was received with the kindest affection by his parents and a fraternal wel- come by his brother. His native air, healthy exercise and cheerful society, contributed to the speedy improvement of the convalescent. Accompanied by his brother James, he frequently enjoyed a country walk. One day they took a stroll in the Church-yard, and their conversa- tion naturally took a more serious turn. James pointed out many a * The new property is to be appropriated as a provision for the Doctor's numerous fsmilv. 238 A STORY OF GRACE. newly-raised mound beneath which had been deposited the earthly remains of one and another of George's old acquaintances. They grew sad at the recognition of many a stone erected to the memory of young has well as old whom " the last enemy" had consigned to earth's final resting-place. " Here lies little Jane Maxwell," said James ; " a month ago she •was a very joy amidst all that was gladsome. I rather like that verse they have put upon her tomb stone, " Suffer little children to come un- to me, and forbid them not." "Ah," exclaimed George, " ' forhid them not ;' and yet children generally, feel that there is something very forbidding in Him who came to reveal the Father. Jesus Christ may have been very attractive to little children while on earth, but they are now taught so much that is repulsive that there is not much chance I apprehend, for the ad- ministration of a similar reproof to that which the disciples erroneously gave on the occasion which drew from the Saviour those beautiful words." " True," observed James somewhat thoughtfully, " the cup of saL vation is tendered to them much as a dose of physic would be, and is generally rejected by the child as objectionable as a black draught." " Of course," returned George, " I do not suppose that the nature and tendency of a child are really different from those of a man, and therefore the discovery of a certain amount of disinclination in the child to heavenly things would not surprise me. But when I think of the dreadfully black colours in which juvenile divinity paints the Being whom the Scriptures represent as yearning with affection even over those whose sins reach to heaven — when I think of the "dreadful hell" with which it is always found convenient and sometimes a pleasure to threaten them, and the" darkness, fire and chains" by which the Almighty is made to them "the king of terrors," I confess it makes my blood boil. Let me hope that little Janie escaped all this; indeed,, she could hardly have been so merry a child had she been at all impressed wdth such diabolical notions. Her mother must have felt her loss exceedingly." " Janie seemed to have no grief, and ' like a dew-drop, she sparkled, was exaled, and caught to heaven.' " " And here lies that old miser, Tom Rich," exclaimed George, pointing to stone, " with nothing ' sacred to' his ' memory' but his name and age." "Pity so much as that is said ; to money not affection is he in- debted for that. I know not what redeeming quality he had ; the mi- serable wretch scarcely had a friend to close his eyes in death, though as rich as Croesus. To happiness he was, I am sure, a perfect stranger." " Doubtless he suffered the woe of those who, in their all-absorbing covetousness, join house to house ; and now though he might have erected a graccf'ul and enduring monument to his memory in the affec- tions of those around him by a wise disposal of his wealth, he will soon be forgotten — ' the name of the wicked will rot.' " " You may recollect Mrs. Harwood, George ; she is buried here. There was always something about her which people did not under- stand. She was upright and rigidly correct, and yet so ready to excuse A STORY OF GRACE. 239 and pass by the faults of others, — so apparently indifferent about that which arouses the Christian bile of others — that she has'been said to be atheistically inclined. Her pity, always practical, seemed to be bound- less, and though she was known to read her bible for several hours du- ring the day, her carelessness about Church, which she did not very often attend, confirmed the suspicion that she was not religious." " I should hope that her unexceptionable moralily — and I do not overlook her forgivingness, it is one thing to pass by a fault and an- other to connive at it — was the result of religious feeling. Her con- stant reference to the scriptures induces in my mind the persuasion that she knew and loved the truth and lived under its influence." The brothers were now before her grave-stone and George read aloud as fellows ; * SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF MRS. HARRIET HARWOOD WHO DEPARTED THIS LIFE, JANUARY 17th. IM- AGED 63 YEARS' ' Christian and Christless — men of all names and creeds, The black with crimes, the bright with -virtuous deeds, The king, the beggar, friend and foe are here, The rich, the poor, the peasant and the peer, All meet together in dread death's domain, Unvarying equality doth here obtain. We equal are as Adam's children, all Equal — as sharers in his guilty fall ; Equal in birth, for we brought nothing in Equal as taking nothing out again. But (cheering thought !) death cannot hold for aye Those for whom Christ ascended up on high : He is death's plagues, and grave's destructions, he Who came to loose and set the pris'ners free. For one and all he shed his precious blood That we, far off, might be brought nigh to God. Equal in condemnation, all the guilty race Alike are loved and saved by sovereign grace. Sinful and helpless I his mercy trust To raise the guilty from this bed of dust — That all in Christ shall rise this glorious strain to sing, _ O grave where is thy victory ? O death where is thy sting ?' George was silent. "The old lady," observed James, " desired those lines to be placed upon her stone, and Parson Brooks says they were written by her for that purpose. His reverence did not much admire them, but he en- gaged to see her wish carried out." " This is very singular" at length exclaimed George ; '' I think I can clear up the mystery of her character, James. But we must return home ; had she any books besides her bible ? and who has them now ?" " I have heard that she never read any other book but the bible, al- though she had quite a little library. Her brother comes in for her property, a good slice of which, however, has been bequeathed to the charities of the neighbourhood." The brothers' conversation was somewhat abruptly interrupted by the approach of an old town acquaintance who walked home with them ; of whom more in the next chapter. 240 CORKKSPOXDEXCE. POETRY. THE SPIRITUAL MINISTRY. " Ye are a royal priesthood, a peculiar people, to shew forth the virtuet of Him who hath called you .... and to offer spiritual sacrifices .... by Jesus Christ." — 1 Pet. ii. 4 — 9. What is the Spirit's ministry? it is The life of God within the soul of man; Besotten, quickened, — embryo life it is — Christ in ourselves, of sin and death the ban. It ministers in living pulses warm. As from the heart of God to all mankind ; It manifests itself amid the storm Or sunshine of man's day, and breathes God's mincl. Ours is its ministry in God's dear Son, When to the sinner we proclaim His love. When by refracted love His will is done, All selfish, speculative, end above. Ours is the Spirit's ministry in speech. Which tells of Jesus to a broken heart. Or when, with tenderness, we do beseech The heedless ones to choose the better part. Their's is fond ministry, "without the word," Who win a husband to the Saviour's fold ; Or who so wield the word — the Spirit's sword — That wife or child need not to be control'd. And ours the Spirit's ministry, whene'er AVe teach our child the work of Christ for him. For him and for all men, howe'er Man's heart runs o'er with hatred to its brim. We minister in faithfulness to them; We urge to flee from youthful bents, which war Against the Spirit, and their joys condemn, That from God's wells they purer pleasures draw. We minister in holy things when we Lift up ourhearts and hands to God, and pray For loving friends, or for our enemy. And for the weal of both select our way. We minister in Jesu's peace to those — AVe tranquillize 'fnid outrages and wrongs — Who desp'rately but aggravate their woes. By rushing headlong to rebellion's thongs. We minister as God's belov'd, indeed, When we avert the shedding of man's blood ; Acting as Christ in every time of need ; Extending e'en to foes His brotherhood. We minister in God's own love, when light And truth we pour on ignorance; Dispelling, with His Word, the mental night. Which wraps our brother in a deatli-fraught trance. In holy tilings we minister again, When by tlie bed of dreaded death we kneel, And banish terror from the soul in pain. By notes of resurrection's joyful peal. We minister for Christ, unto "the world," When we hold firm the Spirit's unity ; And " shew forth" by one loving act unfurled, Love's banner, in the emblems of community. We minister to love when cherished saints Are gathered on some gladsome meeting day, While to meet with them our own spirit faints, And, yet, for other's good, we keep away ! Or when, with some beloved brother, we Might spend a time congenial to our soul. We yet forego the sweet fraternit\% And to some sterner calling, — self control. We minister in true devotion blest. When selfisli care in living is denied ; In toil — in temper for another's best — Following the lead of the self-sacrificed ! And so, too, they who, called by the Church, Accept the Bishop's poor, inglorious, lot ; To oversee and aid, with jealous search. The Church to purge itself from each foul blot. These ministries divine us here do make The people Jesus came to consecrate ; Lifting up holy hands for His loved sake. Bearing in our own hearts th' aZ-o/j ement'« freight. Making our calling and election sure ; Inborn salvation, working out its end; In undefiled religion blameless, pure. Proving that God and Christ, — not men — us send. In Christ's anointed, and to God's heart dear ; Sav'ring of life to life, of death to death ! We consecrate or we condemn whate'er We touch — make free or fetter by our breath ! The mart, the counter, or the servitude. Is heavenly calling when ive hallow it ; Each bears the impress of beatitude. For ours tlie working lamp by Jesus lit! Priests and priestesses to our God above, And to the Lamb,^the sacred fire we keep Ever alive in oiTices of love. In vigils, and in prayers, that never sleep • Joint-heirs of God, with Christ, God-sealed are we! And such our ministries till all be done ; Strangers and pilgrims in our loyalty. We live but to God's world-rejected Son. Waiting our rightful King and kingdom here ; A race ]}ecu iar Jesus to fulfil : Till He ttiumiihaut, to our joy appear. And we remain His own " peculiar" still! Mataab. CORRESPONDENCE. ON THE BECOND DEATH. , subject. But before I send it, I am anxious to ask of your correspondents, To the EdUor of " The UniversaUnl ." \vho have written, or may be preparing Christian Sir, — 1 have it on my mind j to write, an answer to the following ques- to send you a short paper concerning thi; tion. REVIEWS. 2-^1 What one distinctly wovdffl portion of the Scrirpture can be produrcil which so cxplicithi, states that human beings have died, or will die, and that tho very same beings will be raised again to die ' the second death,'' and then, after that, agai7i to be raised, or finally destroyed by it ? Or in other words. Is " Resurrection," usin^ that word in the one pure uniform sense in which the Scriptures a^i«a?/s use it, ever so applied? and death a second time distinctly spoken of, for such very bodies, which have died oice ? The language being so palpable and clear that no one can possibly deny it, without at once positively disowning the very rcord of God itself. 'ihe importance of tlie subject is great and solemn, and should be most gravely weighed in every Christian's mind who touches it in preaching or writing, and for this cause I now agitate the preliminary enquiry. I have read all I could meet with, and feel sadly disappointed at the /aciofany Scriptural evidence. I find ttiat that truth, " the second death,''' like every other truth misunderstood, hampered with dis- crepancy, by writers assmning tlie founda- tion on which they build their positions, instead of simidy laying such foundation in the most immistakeahle language of Scripture itself. Hence arising such very conflicting statements of writers on this awful point. I wish it to be understood, that assump- tions, — conjectures — or inferences ought not to satisfy a Christian searching the ■V^'ord, with God fearing simplicity, on any one given doctrine, and most certainly not on so fearful a theme as the second death. I am aware it is common to reier to Sodom and Gomorrah, and also to what is noi\i\\ite(\\\Q.ni\y{but most tmscriptural- ?y) called " d/te wicked dead," na a. proof of this statement, the " second death" of bodies, but I say, with much Christian kindness and decision, this is by no means satisfactory to »ie ;— at the most, only in- ferential as.-icrtion, which clashes sadly with the Harmony of the word of the Lord Jesus Christ. There can be no Resurrection, but by- Christ, and therefore. He must be the Father of all human beings raised, and these said bodies raised must be either corruptible {sinful) or incorruptible {sin- less) and the difRculty is insurmountable in maintaining the Lord Jesus to be the author of such a resurrection on either view, for '' second death," thereby makins^ the Saviour who died "^o condemn sin in flesh," the Producer of a more unutter- ably awful curse than sin in flesh is ever revealed as producing \ I beg, Christian Sir, to ask permission for this paper, appearing in your next number, to give any Christian brother or sister, during the intervening month and prior to your receiving my paper, for the December number, an opportunity to state any , or what Scriptures explicitly mention Resurrection : andq/i!er thaf'^Ae second death." Un Tout Seul. REVIEWS. " Three Grand Exhibition of Man's Enmity to God.'" By David Thom, D.D., Ph. D. Bold Street Chapel, Liverpool. — London: H. K. Lewis, 15, Gower Street, North: Liverpool, George Philip. 1845. ( Continued from page 225) But we must haston to a consideration of the third and last part of this deeply interesting work, "Denial of divinely revealed Fact,"' as the third grand P^xhi'- bition of man's Enmity to God— And to speak candidly we fear this part will be found more valuable than either of tiie others to the captious cavilling critic, and to such we gladly I<^ave the disagreeable ill natured task, only iiinting that perliaps the fifth cliapter is somewhat too speculative : not but the author has good grounds or data for many of his views and inferences ; yet they are for the most part so dark and gloomy, that we would fain hope he has overwrought the picture. — Towards the conclusion of this cliapter he eloquently writes : — "In Christ's own words, which is ever a pillar of cloud to the world, but of light to the church, separating the one from the other. Exodus xiv. 19, 20. will he to his people be more and more drawing near ; while like lightning " heaven's red artillerv" flashing from east to west, will the true consuming fire of divine revelation, (2 Thes. ii. 8, Heb. xii. 29) be gleaming fitfully from Asia's fertile plains, through cultivated Europe, to lands situated beyond the broad Atlantic wave." The divinely revealed Fact which the "natural man ''so stupidly (we will not say wilfully) denies and thus exhibits his greaest enmiiy to God, is set forth by Dr. Thom in a manner at once so boll, straightforward, and manly, and in a strain, that to us who can see and believe theglorious truth, ismost cheering and delightful. VOL. II. 2 L 242 REVIEWS, As an example take this. — "The gift of everlastins; life by God to man is proclaimed as what actually exists ; as a blessing already bestowed; as what the creature enjoys certainly and indefeasibly, in Christ Jesus the Creator and second Adam, in spite of whatever as a descendant of the first Adam, and of whatever he may have personally been, may be, and is. Heavenly blessings according to the gospel, as made known since the days of the apostles, do actually belong to the creature, not may belong to him. " How clear and unequivocal such a statement! is not this an exhibition of the very height of generosity on the part of God ? The gift itself not earthly, but heavenly blessings; not temporary, but everlasting enjoyments, not improved human nature, but the divine nature. And the conditions. Conditions ? There are none. Nothing is required on the part of the creature ; all is graciously and gratuitously bestowed by the Create*:." Again page 291 : — " Spiritual conscience is the mind rejoicing in the knowledge of a salvation which has been freely bestowed upon it, in consequence of all the conditions prescribed by divine law, having been fulfilled by the Son of God ; and as it progresses is that mind rejoicing more and more in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made it free." This is verv bt^autiful and delightful, and to those who " have ears to hear," experimentally felt to l)e indeed " glad tidings of great jov,'' but to all others, viz. the spiritual asleep and dead, the " dead in trespasses and sins," to all such, as to the learned and ])hilosopical Greeks of old, of course, '■foolishness.'" The fourth ciiapter of this third poi tioii of the work is on the non miraculous but wholly spiritually nature of tlie third and last £eva in which the greatest exhibi- tion of human enmity is manifested. — In this part there are some very sensible remarks on war, as a directly anti-ehristian practice. Aud certainly the writer has higli authority to support him in his condemnation of it, for our Saviour greatly disapproved, and in strong language condemned all war defensive as well as offensive. — And how could the Prince of Peace sanction such demoniac work? Perhaps defensive war appears (but it it only in appeai-ance) more jus- tifiable than offensive, yet remembering the trite adage the second bloiv makes the battle, it is quite clear if there were no defenders there could be no battle, consequently no war : so in this point of view, the defender is the most guilty, since it rests with him, whether there shall be peace or war ; whether he will magnanimously fo)-give, or foolishly and wickedly return the blow, and thus commence a warfare that but for his weak and sinful conduct would never have taken place. On pages 316 &c. is described a much higher, more spiritual, and we should say, a more acceptable worship and service, seeing it must jnecessarily spring from the heart, than the repeating at set times, prescribed forms of prayer be- fore men, as if in imitation of the disgusting Pharisees, wiio did so " to be seen of7?Hn;" and which called forth from our Lord such severe animadversions. Indeed both by precept and example, the blessed Lord and Saviour condemned the custom, (or he never prayed in public, no, wlien he wished to enjoy this privilege he always retired apart: even in the garden of Gethsemane, when lie bad only three individuals with him, it is recorded, he left them to pray the Father if it were possible the cup nnght pass from him; yea, each separate time it is said, he went away again and prayed ; and so should we, had we high and delicate notions of prayer. 'J'here is not one instance given of Christ's going into the synagogue to pray, though many of his entering it *' to leach and to preach.'' And his instructions on prayer shew the same disapprobation of public worship : But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut the door, pray to thy Father, which is in secret, and thy Father which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly. Matt. vi. G. That a body of n)en should be set apart to make the Scriptures their exclu- sive study, aiid then give the result of that study in t-ermons and expositions from the pulpit "every sabbath day'' is all very proper and desirable; because there are luunher.s, who have neither the leisure or ability to study for them- selves, and also many who though ihcy may^ have the ability, have not the op- REVIEWS. 243 portunitv, so much do secular affairs occupy them ; tlien these secular affairs unfit the mind for the task, for, as in the days of the Apostles so now "the spirit kisteth against the flesh, and the flesh against the spirit." Gal. v. 17. but we would have men, both clergy and laity, pray at home, in their closets, and pray with the heart and understanding, and not with ihe lips merely, which last kind of prayer never has reached the throne of grace, nor never will. There would be apparently less devotion, and in reality far fewer prayers said, but we hope, indeed feel confident there would be more real true devotion, such as springs from the heart, and not the mere empty offering o? lip service which in the sight of God, all know, or ought to know, is an abomination. Pages 328 — 9 contain remarks on poverty and the poor which we cannot exactly pass over suh silentio ; thus our author writes : — " Allowances to the poor are cut down to the lowest possible degree ; the usage to which they are exposed is of the harshest description ; and even oppression of them when calculated to save the pockets of the wealthy, not only meets with impunity, but occasionally with approbation." Again ; " Lender the Christian dispensation they actually enjoy fewer comforts and privileges than they did under the inferior and despised dispensation of Moses." This last assertion, that the poor have fewer privileges under the Christian than the Mosaic dispensation, we ai-e much disposed to doubt and gainsay, for they were then as now equally subject to the " proud man's contumely,' and other pains and penalties attendant upon poverty, according to the testi- mony of Solomon, Job, and other old Testament writers. We fear there is more truth in the former; yet it may be said in extenuation, it is almost neces- sary, for were the poor not treated with sc^me degree of severity, the}' would soon live altogether, like drones in a hive, upon the industrious and provident part of the community, so indolent is man by nature, and so rarely is he im- bued with a proper, laudible spirit of independence. 'I'hen it should be borne in mind, though poverty is not a crime in itself, it is in nineteen cases out of twenty the effect of crime, yea, the inevitable effect, and just punishment and retribution. What can the vices of extravagance, idleness, drunkenness, &c. bring their victims to but poverty? Slothfulness casteth into a deep sleep, and an idle soul shall suffer hunyery Prov. xix. 15. also Ibid, xx. 13, xxiv. 30 — 34. xxviii, 19. lirc. and in the New Testament it is written : — " If any would not work, neither should he eat. 2 Thessalonians iii. 10. There are also many more passages to the same effect, both in the Old andNew 'J'estar nient Scriptures, that we could point out, had we space to insert them. Yet we are far from approving of undue severity, indeed any except where it is absolutely required to check the idle from living upon the industrious; and consider it ill becomes our fellow-creature thus to treat another wantonly and that it shows a sad deficiency of Christian charity and benevolence. The poor, from their ignorance and the puerile state of their minds, like children, have a strong claim U|)on our indulgence and forbearance, yet there are cases in which we should do both injustice did we not treat them with severity. The last and concluding chapter gives 1st. An explanation of the nature and extent of man's enmity and of man's punishment, as distinguished from their progressive manifestations; secondly, of the nature and extent of the divine Mercy, as distinguished from its pro- gressive manifestations, and thirdly, of the way in which law, sin, and death are progressively destroyed. In considering this subject, we would remark whether it were necessary or not man's nature should be manifested so progressively^ it certainly was that the divine nature ("God is love") shoul.l, since from the very limited nature of man's faculties and these bi-ing at first wholly undeveloped it was utterly im- possible he could receive or bear the full blaze of Deity, as " the all in all;" (conceiving the manifestation of God or the divine Mercy to be the best manifes- tation of his nature, i. e. of himself) Indeed, we suspect man has but an extremely faint glimpse now of the Deity in this advanced stage of manilesta- 214 TIEVIEWS. tion, and can only have wliiUt in flesh ; I'or, to use the original and graphic lan- guage of Shakespeare, with a slight alteration : — " But whilst this muddij vesture of decay Doth grossly close us in, wo caunut see it," tl>at is in all its length, and breadth and height and depth. Yet the fact is, Deity and his divine attribute of mercy are, as to the letter, as much revealed or manifested, and have been now for near two thousand years, as ever they will he, the volume of inspiration being clost-d for ever; i=till man receives the manife.-tatioii progressively and in proportion as his meiital faculties become developed and his mind spiritualized. And as this developement and spirituali- zation are now partial and limited; hence the now partial and limited glimpse of Deity and this divine attribute. In speaking of the destruction of law, sin and death, both actually and vir- tually, Dr. Thom thus states it : " In Jesus as crucified descending into hades, and in his rising again from the dead, law, sin and death, were in so far as he himself was personally concerned, actually destroyed. And in so far as the church and the world are concerned law, sin and death were, in the three events just enumerated as having happened to our blessed Lord, virtually destroyed likewise. In the conscience of every man who is born from above, law, sin and death, are so far as the knowledge and nature of Christ glorified extend, destroyed also ; being swallowed up now in earnest, and hereafter in the fulness of divine love, righteousness and life. The love of God superseding law, the righteousness of God superseding sin, and the life of God super- seding death by swallowing it up in victory." 1 Cor. xv. 54. " Not so however, externally or manifestatively, and in so far as this world is con- cerned, are law sin and death destroyed." " These enemies of man, looked at it in the way I am about to bring them under notice, are seen to undergo a progressive destruction or annihilation." Here reference is made to the 20th. and seven following verses of xv. chap, of 1st. Cor. Again speaking of the epochs or periods mentioned in Scripture the Dr. says : — " Besides the three seras epochs or periods of which I have already treated, three other epochs, eeras or periods, connected with the former, and yet distinct from them, are alluded to and marked out in Scripture. The first runs trom the begin- ning of the world till the close of the apostolic ministry, the perfecting of the volume of inspiration, and the destruction of JerusrJem. This period embraces the whole series of miraculous divine interpositions, of all kinds and for all purposes. The second runs from the close of the one just alluded to till the end of time and of this present world. During this period, no miracles exist, or can exist ; every thing proceeding according to fixed general principles, whether natural or spiritual. The third runs from the end of lime till the constvmmation of all thinys." Query when is to be the locna standi (d' t'.iis thii-d and last period, if it is not to commetice till after " time shall be no more,'' and the destruction of this pre- se'i' world shall have t;ikcn place? Because it is clear the events of this last peiiod cannot occur on this earth, if it is to be destro3'ed and swept away previously; and yet one cannot but sujijiose they must have some place, stage or theatre on which they may be en- acted— Dr. Thom describes it, p. 487, as a period when there will be no divine law, but if we understand him ri;.ht, at the presr?/l time ihere is no divine law, that, according to him, having been abolished when the Mosaic dispensation wa' overttn-ned, and a'-^surediy that is tlie case to the believer to whom " Christ is t!ie end of the law for righteousness." Horn. x. 4. Then as to the term " the constunmation of all things," we see little in Scrip- ture to lead us lo expect that this world, as a planetary orb, is destined ever to be de-troyed, natural as it is to infer that whatever has had a beginning must hiivp an end. 'I'he world was said to be destroyed by the flood, yet we know it was only ir.an and the other living creature.s wjjich were destroyed, and that we arc now li'dng on tlie same veritable earth Adam and all the other anti-diluvians did. — A.-* geology informs us, there was a time when the earth was in such a REVIEWS. 245 state, man could not exist upon it, so it is possible lliut by volcanic agency and concurrant causes it may again become so unfit a ve>itleiice tor him, that he nmst of necessity cease to be a denizen on it; but tliut then by the wonderful power of God (for what is too hard for Him to etl'ect ? ) it may be a very suit- able and delightful jjlace of abode for a much higher order of beings than man. Yet whilst this globe retains its present position as a heavenly body and con- tinues to revolve on its axis, so as to produce day and night, summer and win- ter, spring and autumn, we cannot see hov/ time can be no more : because for that to be eflected tliere must be one perpetual now knowing no change what- ever ; since it is only l)y the alternation of day and night and the variations of the seasons that the flight of time is marked, or that that flight becomes per- ceptible. But much that Dr. Thorn refers to this period appears to us to be going on nutu. — It is, he says, to be a " period of death ;" and so is the present time, for the majority assuredly are dead, " dead in trespasses and sins," and none but the "little flock'' who alone have part in the "first resurrection,'' can, in the proper sense of the word " life, '' be said to be alive. Then animal life, in whatever degree of vigour and strength it may be possessed, compared with spiritual and eternal life, is only death ; hence the reason why our Saviour said every man, possessing only such life, is ^'counted dead while he liveth. '' On page 471 — 2 is drawn the delightful and enviable state of mind of the be- liever in such language that we should like to give the whole, but (or want of space can only bring in the conciiiding sentence or two; as follows; — " Benig now the servant of love, he has of necessity thereby become also the servant of righteousness, Rom. vi. 18. viii 4, — And thus he who is made the recipient of the divine principle, through God in the Scriptures personally addressing him. Matt. vii. 9. Rev. xiii. 9, besides finding as, a matter of fact, that as one with Christ glorified he is set free from the bondage of law, Rom. viii. 4, finds also tliat in virtue of the same divine relation, the bondage of sm and death has as to him passed aicay Jor ever." — John viii. 36, 1st. John iii. 6 — 8 : Gal. ii. 20. Lengthened as our comments and extracts have become, we cannot conclude without again confidently recommending not only this work, but all Dr. Thom lias written to the attention of the public, as the productions of a master-mind, and of one who is a full century before his age. And let none be discouraged by the labour they require ; for certainly there is much real hard reading in them ; but then tlie style is so first rate and the arguments so clear and strong that they soon, as it were, rivit the reader's mind to the subject, and so closely, that he forgets the toil in the profit and instruction he is reaping. We have now dene, as it is not our purpose to touch upon the Appendix where Dr. Thom, with his usual acnteness and ability, answers some objections raised by two reviewers against his " Divine Inversion.'' E. An Analytical Arrangement of the TIoiij Scriptures, according to the principles developed under the name of Parallelism, in the writings oj Bishop Loivtit, Bishop Jebb, and the Rev. Thomas Boys. V/iih an Appendix and Notes. By Richard Baillie Roe, B.A. In two vols. 8vo. Pp. xxi, 560, and 618. London, H. K. Lewis, Gower Street, North. 1851. Sadly puzzled and perplexed often are Reviewers when stmimoned to act in their critical capacity. Wliat course of conduct sliall they pursue in regard to him, who stands for the moment at their bar ? Shall he be dealt with harsh- ly or leniently i Shall his errors and shortcomings be laid thoroughly open to public view, or shall a mantle of charity be thrown over him 1 Shall he be condemned without mercy, or extolled to the skies? In such a state of dubiety, it is true, a conscientious man will rarely, if ever, be involved. And should he be so, he will get out of it, by being guided in his decision by an upright and impartial consideration of the circumstances of the case. But all i-eviewers are not conscientious men. Hence spring their chief difficulties and their manner 24G KEVitws. of extricating themselves from them. Hence, instead of an attempt being made to untie the Gordian Knot, it is too frequently cut, and an opinion pronounced, not having reference solely to the merits of the work, but under the influence of private attachment, party spirit, the dictates of fashion, personal interest, or j)ersonal malignity. Whim and caprice, it is to be feared, in but too many instances turn the scale. " Man clotlied with a little brief authority,'' literary as well as social, is apt to "play very fantastic tricks." Of all the situations of difhculty, however, in which a reviewer can be placed, perhaps the most embarrassing is that in which he cannot but be aware, that his author knows vastly more about the subject treated of, tiian he himself does. This is no uncommon case. Nay, it is extremely common. How under such circumstances is the critic to act? Autnors in general do write, or at all events should write, respecting subjects with which they have not only some acquaintance, but which they have carefully studied, and of which, under certain aspects at lea.-t, they have made themselves masters. What right, indeed, has any man, unless au fait in regard to some particular depart- ment of knowledge, to pretend to enlighten his ftllows concerning it ? Critics however are differently situated. Whatever may be the extent of their per- sonal vanity, or however conventionally a sort of omniscience may be ascribed to them, it must be obvious to the least reflective mind, that as respects a great variety of topics, they must be either entirely, or in a great measure ig- norant. They cannot know every thing. Few or none of them are 'admirable Chrichtuus, " or can boast of the learning and memory of a Magliabeechi. To them applies emphatically, the vita brevis, cirs tonga. A smattering of knowledge is all that at the utmost, on uiost topics, they can possess; and well for them, if even this be properly digested and accurate. What ave such parties to do when men cleverer and better informed than themselves are brought up for judgment? Critics they are, or have constituted themselves. In this capacity, a decision is exj)ected at their hands. Shall tiiey confess their ignorance, and consequent- ly their inability to try the case? Alas! this is rather too much to expect from pjor, frail, proud humanity. The critic fancies that he must say something authoritatively. Whatever may be the extent of his knowledge, or rather of his ignorance, the oracle must speak. Nothing must escape his lips of the na- ture of an acknowledgment of incapacity. And what better mode of disguising his inferiority, than by giving himself airs, and rightly or wrongly playing the part of censor? The author, therefore, is found fault with. His talents and learning are underrated. Although, it may bo, the critic is totally unable to understand the author's principles, follow him in his reasonings, and appreciate the force of his conclusions, he is nevertheless incessantly cavilling, nuiking much of petty blemishes and absolutely bursting out into an lo, iriumphc, on occasion of the rectifying of a wrong date, or the supplying of the exact wonln, and the exact paije of a quotation. Occasionally the inferiority of the judge is attempted to be concealed, by a different species of tactics. He aflects to act the part of patron. His author is insulted, by being made the object of his pity. He, pcrliaps, "damns him with faint praise,'' or gives him the benefit of his kind and condescending suggestions. Thus by dint of sheer impudence, are ignorance and knowledge made to exchange places. The critic, whose acquaintance with a subject may not amount to one thousandth part of that which is exhibited in the able and carefully written production lying before iiim, is found, strange to tell, cullinci it up, and consigning it and its author lo the ridicule of his contemporaries. If lie can do nothing else, Zoilus-like, he can carp. And provided that his notice be clcerly and plausibly written, ten chances to one but his ignorance and presumption are, by a discerning public crowned with the laurels which justly belong to him, whose learned laboms he has been malevo- lently engaged in distorting and depreciating. Feelingly have the preceeding observations been penned. As regards Scrip- ture ParuUdiiin, and m f-everal other respects, we stand in the position of in- feriors to him, wliose book now lits on our table, and claims our attention. Our pride is of course grievously wounded, both by the fact, and by the necessity REVIEWS, 247 of admitting it. But no practical difFicnlty, if any moment, is experiencd by us on this account. The path of duty is abundantly plain. So far from being' disposed to carp at or disparage the " Analytical Arrangement," because ema- nating from one who has outstripped us in his attainment>-, and acquaintance witii the subject of whicli he treats — how much by lapse of time, and engage- ment in other pursuits, of what we once knew concerning it, have we forgot- ten ! — and so far from deeming ourselves qualified to patronize that, which soars into a region of knowledge far beyond our ken, we are content merelv to draw attention to the book, and to express our heart-felt admiration of the ability, learning, taste, discrimination, and industry, which we find every page of it to display. Mr. Roe who on the present occasion appears before the public — formerly Richard Koe, now diatinctioyus causa, and by the addition of his mother's maid- en name, Richard Baillie Koe — is no new or unknown author, A veteran in years, he is also a veteran in literature. Eiglity-seven or eighty-eif^lit sum- mers have passed over the head of this venerable and venerated man. And in the fields of literature and science, he has long been an able, an arduous and a successful worker. The Royal Irish Academy, Grafton Street, Dublin, was for a period of seventeen years, benefited by his services as its active and painstakiu"- officer. While connected with tliat influential body, he wrote, and published, under its patronage, his learned and instructive treatise on R,hythm.* This* •^a.5 followed up by his " Analytical Arrangement of the Apocalypse,"-]- and bv two extremely valuable pamphlets on the doctrine of Universal Salvation. | OuV friend, perhaps, has published more. The works named, we speak of, as hav- ing been seen and perused by us. At last, in the decline of life, with " the hoary head as a crown of righteousness,'' and with nearly exhausted physical energies — at a time long posterior to that at which literary men have either been donali rude, or have stept into their graves — Mr, Roe comes forward with a closely printed 8vo. book, com|)rising, in its two volumes, about 1200 pages. To say merely that it exhibits no trace of senility, is, althou"!! true but' faintly and inadequately to describe its merits; for it is characterised by a vigour of intellect, a strength of memory, and a clearness as well as soundness of judgment, eminently fitted to excite our astonishment. Blessed be God that our dear friend has been spared to complete, and to witness the publication of this his leading work. Our respect and love for the man, and our admiration of the author we con- fess to be almost unbounded. His abandonment of the ministry, in the Estab- lished Church, for conscience' sake — his submission to, and profession of the doctrine of Universal Saltation, from the time that it commended itself to his understanding, as a truth of God's most blessed word — his modiiication of his views concerning it, in proportion as he was enlightened by the Scriptures — his calm, but steadfast and uniform opposition to the awful, because anti- scriptural mode of maintaining it, now so prevalent \n the United States of America — his decidedly evangelical sentiments — his pure and spotless life and the quiet, unobti-usive, influential, and sober piety bv which he has ever been distinguished, have positively endeared him to our afi'ectious. Besides, who can fail to cherish respect for a mind so benevolent, so honourable, so noble as his ? His great talents, we know. His attainments have lono- struck us as being not more remarkable, than is the singular modesty, and aversion to dis- play, with which they are accompanied. What the richest mental resources and the most diversified learning could enable our friend to accomplish, we * The Principles of Rhythm, both in speech and music. Published under the patronage of the " Royal Irish Academy." Dublin; Printed by R. Graisberry. IS23. + An Analytical Arrangement of the Apocalypse, or Revelation' recorded by St. John ; according to the principles developed under the name of Parallelism, &c. By Richard Roe Dublin- R. M. Tims. 1834. I A short help and incentive to an unbiassed inquiry into the scripture truth of Universalism Dublin 1835 ; and "Notes in answer to certain parts of three recent pulications on future pun ishment, to which are added letters to the author from three beneficed clergymen." Dubiin 1836 8^3 REVU.WS. were prepared for. Every requisite scluilarlike qualificatiori, under the guid- ance and control of the most extjuisite taste, we were certain tliat lie possessed and could at any time call into exercise. But, notwithstanding, his actual product has taken us agreeahly by surprise. When we considered his ad- vanced age, and tlie inlirniitics with which the decline of life is almost neces- sarily accompanied, we were prepared to make great allowances. Such allow- ances, however, we find are totally uncalled for. Mr. Roe still handles his lance with power, and hurls it at its object with unerring precision. How few literary men, even in the heyday of youth and vigour, and with all iheir men- tal faculties hraced and striuig to the uttermost, could have produced a work, indicative of such calm, sustained, efficacious, and successful energy? The " Analytical Arrangement " is, indeed, in more respects than one, a most extraordinary production. When known, it can hardl}' fail to take its place among the standard theological works of our age and country. Scarcely has a centiuy elapsed, since Ihat eminent scholar and di\ine, Robert Lowth, then Professor of Poetry at Oxford, and afterwards Bishop of London, announced in his prelections, de poesi IlehrcEorvm, his having dis- covered certain peculiarities in the construction and arrangement of the Hebrew metre. These consisted, not in the fact of that species of composition being scanned by feet, as among the Greeks and Romans, or in the use of rhymes, as among the moderns. They were connected with the substance, and entered into the very essence of the poetry. They sprang from the subject- matter itself. And by it they were ati'ected and regulated. These ])eculiar forms he found to be extremely varied. Sometimes a first and a third line, a second and a fourth, corresponded in their structure, as in their matter. Sometimes a first agreed with a lourth, and a second with a third. Sometimes the forms extended over, and embraced larger portions of Holy Writ: a first line holding correspondence with a tenth, a second with a ninth, a third with an eighth, a fourth with a seventh, and a fifth with a sixth. Sometimes twenty lines, and even more, were connected together in varying, but sjmmetrical forins. In the principal arrangements, subordinate ones he frequently found involved. And the forms in question he observed to be as often dependent on contrast, as on agreement. Nor were the immediate forms all. Forms of peculiar structure he saw after intervals recuriing. and bearing a relation to those which had gone before. Larger divisions of these seemed to comprehend smaller oties. The whole assumed to his mind the aspect of a mass of ideal and verbal crystallizatio'.is. What had drawn towards it his attention, the learned Bishop has succinctlv, bat ably and elegantly described and delineated. 'i'o the Old Testainent, and of it the poetical portions, his observations are almost entirely, we might be justified in saying are altogether confined. * In the person of a brother-prelate, the late Bishop Jebb of Limerick, Dr. Lowth has found a talented and fitting coadjutor. That distinguished scholar had remarked, that the principle of parallelism applies to portions of the New Testament Scriptures, as well as of the Old. Upon a minute and critical in- vestigation of this subject, he was induced to enter. Discovery after discovery rewarded his labours. And at last he published, as the fruit of them, his "Sacred Literature; comprising a review of the principles of composition laid down by the late Robi-rt Lowth, D.l)., Lord Bishop of London, in his Prelec- tions and Isaiah: and an application of the principles so reviewed, to the illus- tration of the New Testammt." London, 1820. This is an elegant, and truly scholarlike production, worthy to take its place along with that of his illustrious predecessor. 'i'he tendencv of many portions of the New Testament writings to throw themselves into the forms and combinations, which had already caught the eye of Lowth, while prosecuting his inquiries into the nature and structure of Hebrew Poetry, Dr. Jebb has demonstrated in a maimer, ai once beautiful and convincing. • His remarks on the suljject in his " Pi selections" are followed out in hi- well-known and celebrated Trans. at ion ol Ibuiah, wilti .Votes. REVIEWS. 249 To Mr. Boys, a London Clergyman, however, was reserved the high honour of shewing that tlie principle observed by the two Bishops and limited by them to compositions of a strictly poetical kind, has a far wider range and extent of application. He was enabled to see that it actually pervades the whole structure of the volume of inspiration. This reverend gentleman, besides having most admirably illustrated the principre in his " Key to the Book of Psalms," has, in his "Tactica Sacra,'' made "an attempt to develop and to exhibit to the eye, by tabular arrangements," this rule of composition as prevailing throughout even the prosaic portions of the divine record. If not satisfied that Mr. Boys has always succeeded — if suspicious that occasionally he has pushed matters into the regions of conjecture, subtlety, and overstrained refinement — a careful examination of his two works just alluded to, especially of the latter, which contains an analysis, on the principles of parallelism, of the " First Epistle to the Thessalonians," have served to convince us of the general correctness of his views, as well as of the great ingenuity and learning which have so emi- nently qualified him for the due perfomance of his self-imposed task. Fourth on the list of " Analytic " worthie.s, and far surpassing them all in the extent to which his researches into the subject have been carried, and the success with which they have been crowned, is our friend, Mr. Roe. Beyond Mr. Boys, in principle, it was of course impossible for him to go. But much remained to be done in the way of examination and application. Many diffi- culties required to be overcome. Many objections to be met and obviated. There was a large void to be filled up. The scope for mental acumen, learned industry, and scriptural knowledge was immense. What remained to be done, Mr. Roe has accomplished. By him, the entire Scriptures, Old and New, have upon the principles of parallelism — the term be it remembered, which by common consent has been applied to this peculiar phenomenon of Divine Revelation — been analysed. Every book — every section — every verse, even, has by him been taken to pieces and examined. After having been rigidly, but reverently- dissected, the whole has again been put together. Synthesis has succeeded to analysis. A comprehensive view of each book has been taken. Its relations to other books, and to the whole, have been investigated, and are exhibited. Mr. Roe having thus acted, not only in conformity to the injunctions of Holy Writ itself,* but upon the best and most approved principles of the Baconian Philosophy. The fact is, our friend is not a man to take any human theory upon trust. He must enquire and decide for himself. To foes he will listen, no less than to friends. Hence, under his hands, and in passing through his mind, Lowth's principle — indeed the whole subject — has been subjected to the test of a severe, but wholesome and most impartial ordeal. Pure gold, he well knew, could suffer nothing by being made to pass through the fire. The result we have in the work now before us. Commenced at a period, when the author was long past middle age — when the evening of life had already begun to cast its shadows over his path — it has been prosecuted by him, until very recently, under the guidance of a clear head, and a matured understanding. An arduous undertaking for any single unaided individual it was. But what may not talents, learning, pel-severance, with the divine blessing effect? His " Analytical Arrangement of the Apocalypse," published in 1834, was the pilot balloon, by which our author endeavoured to ascertain the current of public opinion, and his prospects of success in the event of embarking in a mightier undertaking. Well fitted was this work to sustain, and even increase his already well-earned fame, and to prepare for what has followed. Doomed to disappointment, no doubt in some respects, Mr. Roe was. Apathy, in quarters where he might least have expected it, met his well-meant and ably- executed attempt. Other minds would have despaired. Not his. He knew the value of his principle. Some, besides, hailed his Essay with delight. Most valuable and instructive did they find its Preface to be. Equally so, its Notes. The work itself exhibited to them the structure of the Apocalypse reducd to » 1 Cor. ii. 13, 15. x. 15, xiv. 20. 1 Peter iii. 15, VOL. II. 2 M 250 REVIEWS. an intelligible form. As the germ of a literary enterprise of greater magnitude, it justified the most sanguine anticipations; and these, the appearance of the pre!--eiit work has more than realized. Two octavo volumes constitute the condensed form, in which this most useful assistant to the understanding of the inspired records, is bronglit under public notice. Had larger funds been forthcoming, a larger work, uiih copious explanations and illustrations, wouldhave been forthcoming also. The " Analyti- cal Arrangement " would then have piesented less of the appearance of dry bones. The plan pursued in the work on tlie " Apocalypse," of giving the ipsissima verba of the original text, with a translation, would in this case likewise have been adopted. But, alas ! in aid of the ])ublication of this most valuable theo- logical desideratum, no public funds have been provided. The national purse, so often opened for trifling and unworthy purposes — so often lavish of its contents in the cause of pi-olligacy, corruption, or wholesale murder — has been closed against him. Literary men have stood aloof. 'I'heologians have been silent, or have indulged in a contemptno\is sneer. Upon his own limited private resources, Mr. Roe has had to rely. He has been obliged to benefit others, at his own expense. He has like many other able and eminent men, contributed to render an essential service to the world, by a large pecuniary sacrifice, in addition to his previous large and long-continued sacrifice of time, labour, industry, and learning. He has produced his admirable and excellent work, in the best form which circumstances permitted — good, but destitute of die illustrations, which each reader must from the Scriptures supply for himself — not in the best form absolutely considered, for that the possession of ampler means alone could have rendered practicable. Wliat Mr. Roe has published is enough, and more than enough, not only to be intelligible, but to vindicate his high claims to the attention of Biblical scholars, and Christian men. In his first volume, he gives a comprehensive tabular' view, as well as complete analysis of eveiy book of the Old Testament. And this he follows up, in his second volume, by a similar mode of dealing with the books of the New. No necessary reference is omitted. Chapter and verse may in a moment be turned to. The illustrations and confirmations derivable from the Hebrew and Greek originals can, without any difiicult}', be instantaneously supplied. All is clear and perspicuous. There is no confusion and no possibility of mistaking the author's meaning. Never has any work of the same size come under our notice, throughout which greater neatness correctness, and classic elegance more uniformly prevail. To the Biblical student it is indispensable. And there is no individual, capable of reading and of putting two ideas together, by whom an interest is taken in the inspired volume, who can fail to be benefited by it. Ikiefis the Preface, but, like the work itself, condensed and valuable. Every necessary statement is made, and all necessary information is commu- nicated. 'I'he principles of Parellelism are simply, beautifully, and philosophi- cally explained. Indeed, what its amiable, excellent, and learned author had already hinted in an early No. of the " Universalist, " (see Vol. i. pp. 55 — 58,) is here brought under public notice in a somewhat more amplified form. Ac- cording to Mr. Roe, there are not only signs of our ideas, and regular ways or orders in whichthey may be presented, but these ways or orders, on the principle ot parallelism or correspondence, may be easily reduced to classes. Bishop liOWth had arranged and treated of correspondences as the synonymous, the antithetic, and the suithetic. By our author they are comprised "under the four general heads of extent, form, manner, and circumstance.'' Preface, p. i). Admirably simple and pors])icuons illustrations of his meaning are by him subjoined. The singular modesty of this preface is not less conspicuous, than are the sound sense, logical accuracy, condensation, and learning which it displays. Tiie order in which Mr. Roe lias seen meet to place the Sacred Books may with propriety be noticed. In the Old Testament, after the Song of Solomon, the airangement of the prophetical writings adopted lias been, Jonahj Amos, REVIEWS. 251 Hosea, Isaiah, Joel, Micali, Naimm, Zeplianiali, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Habukknk, Daniel, Obadiah, Ezekiel, Haffsjai, Zechariah, Malachi. In this the New Testament there is no deviation from the ordinary plan, nntil after the Acts of tlie Apostles. There, however, we proceed from the Book of Revelation, as conceived to hold the next place, throngb. Galatians, 1st Thessalonians, 2nd Thessalonians, 1st Corintliians, 2nd Corinthians, 1st Timothy, Romans, James, Ephesians, Colossians, Philemon, Philippians, Hebrews, 2nd Timothy, Titus, 1st Peter, 2ik] Peter, Jude, 1st Jolin, 2nd John, and 3rd Jolm, to some " detached arrangements," with which this portion of the work closes. In thus disposing of the Prophets and Epistles our author informs \is, vol. ii. p. 337, that he has been influenced by a regard " to their chronological order," " The order of the Prophets,'' he furtlier ac- quaints us, " is taken from Gray ; and that of the Epistles, for the most part from Hales." At the end of the " Analytical Arrangement" of the New Testament Scrip- tures, volume second, we meet with an Appendix of no great lengtli, and mak- ing no pretensions to originality, of v\'hich it is impossible to speak too higlily. The substance of learned and laborious volumes is condensed into it. Particular- ly are we delighted with the former part of it. Having hinted at the value of Kennicott and De Rossi's readings of the Old Testament, and the selection from them in Boothroyd's Hebrew Bible; and also at Griesbach and Scholz's amended texts of the New Testament, he favours us with some observations of his own as to the qualities by which the best translation of the Holy Scrip- tures should be characterised, furnishes us with specimens of the manner in which it should be executed, nnd actually epitomizes Campbell's "Preliminary Dissertatious," so far as they bear on the subject of translation, and Primate Newcome's " Historical view of English Biblical translations,'' wilhhi the com- paxs of abont right octavo pages* Truly the power of mind, and physical toil implied in making this compend are wonderful. To those who are unable, or unwilling to consult the works themselves to which we have referred, Mr. Roe's abstract must be invaluable. One circumstance, most honourable to our friend, we may notice en passant. Whenever quoting from an author, or ascribing to him any sentiment, he may be trusted to. This we could not predicate of every one. The second part of the Appendix treats most luminously of "Arrangement, ti^pics, and references.'' Two specimens, by way of illustrating the author's manner of procedure — one taken from the Old, and one from the New Testament — we are furnished with. Concerning the " Notes," we feel ourselves bound to speak in terms of the highest approbation. The extent and variety of reading, and the matured judgment which they exhibit, combined with the degree of instruction which they convey, are perfectly astonishing. To what topic, almost, in the course of his long, useful, and laborious life, has not the attention of Mr. Roe been directed? In philology — in logic — in metaphysics — in history — in poetry — in classic literature — in sciencf — in philosophy — in Biblical criticism — and in Theology, he seems to be always and equally at home. And yet over all his faculties, and regulating the use of his richly accumulated stores, as their tute- lary genii, appear presiding, a calm, sound, discriminating judgment, and fer- vent scriptural piety. His notes are not exclusively philological. They are not tainted with German mysticism or rationalism. They are not disfigiued by the spirit of religious partisanship. They are as varied, as are the topics bv which they are suggested. Frequently novel and unexpected are the views which they present. But always to the point. The first note, which is prefatory as well as explanatory, may for clearness, condensation and good sense, be taken as a fitting specimen of the literary and moral tone which pervades the * Mr. Roe is careful to guard himself against being supposed to acquiesce indiscriminately in the Archbishop's xxi Rules or Canons. He suggests several exe^edingly valuable exceptions, modifications, and additions. 352 REVIEWS. whole. The generosity, controlled by disccnimeiit, by which the " Notes'' are characterised, is not their least romavkable feature. Some critics and com- mentators write, as if it were their wish to be supposed acquainted only with authors of standard reputation, and acknowledged merit. However much they may have been indebted to otiier sources for valuable hints, and impor- tant discoveries, all allusions to them are carefully, and of set purpose sup- pressed. To be honest, not to say generous, would be, forsooth ! to compro- mise their literary dignity. Hence, upon stolen property, to a certain degree, they live and thrive. And, " O no, we never mention them," as it denotes their practice, so might it fitly be adopted by them as tlieir motto. Not so however, Mr. Roe. He is above such meanness. Perhaps, by some even he may be imagined to have carried matters occasionally to the opposite extreme. Intimately conversant with the works of the most approved writers on the various subjects of which he treats, he has not disdained to look into books of a religious kind which the world has generally agreed to taboo, or which the world passes b}' with contempt. And wherever in such books, or in the course of his private correspondence, he lias met with a view which has sppeared to him ingenious and important as well as true, or a suggestion which he has conceived might be turned to account, he has not hesitated to quote it, stating, at the same time, honestly and honourably, the source to which he has been indebted »for his information. It was this nobility of mind on the part of Mr. Roe, combined with his many other excellencies of charac- ter, which long since attracted our notice, as it has, ever since the commence- ment of our acquaintance, been confirming towards him our esteem. Sickened we have long been by the petty feelings, and paltry jealousies of authors, lite- rary men, and critics. Mr. Roe is one of the very few eminent men known to us, who has succeeded in soaring into a region above the mean and the contemptible. We can discover no drawback of the slightest consequence on the work now ander review. We almost wish, for the sake of our critical reputation, that we could have found out some material defect to fasten on and carp at. But really everything is executed in the best possible fashion. The plan proposed IS followed out undevialingly to the very close ; and as the end proposed is excellent, so are the means employed to reach it, tiie best that could have been devised and adopted. Everything by which the usefulness of his work could b3 promoted, he has in one way or another contrived to introduce. Where such varied, extensive, and accurate learning as Mr. Roe possesses, is found united to a judgment so sound and mature, and a taste so exquisite, what else than a work of superior value could have been the result? True, we differ in some respects from our respected friend, the author. We are not inclined to form so high an estimate of the value of the labours of the eminently learned and talented Dr. Lee, late Arabic Professor at Cambridge, as he appears to be. Besides which, we think — perhaps, we may be wrong — that he attributes a little too much importance to the theory of the celebrated John Hutchinson.* Upon some other topics, we assert our right to dissent from Mr. Roe — the right being one which all human beings possess, with re- gard to the views and opinions of one another. But how few and unimportant are our points of disagreement with the dear and venerated author of the * since ve first became acquainted witli this theory, between thirty and thirty-five years ago in consequence of a perusal of tlie abridgment of it given by President Forbes, of Cullodon, in his well-known treatise, until now, our conviction of the learning, classical and talmudical, and of the ingenuity displayed by its inventor, have been on the increase. Nay we are ready to admit the great services which he has rendered to the student of the Scriptures, and the light which his hibours have served to throw on their peculiar phraseology; IJesides, we do not intend to assert, that in his ingenious exposition of the Cherubim, he, with Parkhurst and others, his followers, is altogether mistaken. All we dare say is, that he does not satisfy us He is too ingenious. Too rational, and yet to fanciful. The basis of his theory may, however be right after all. Morrison's Coriginally of Perth); view of the subject, we have examined and compared with Hutchinson's Kxceedingly clever, it is likewise. Still, we lack satisfac- tion. A thorough, complete interpretation of tlie Cherubim is, it seems to us, yet a desideratum. REVIEWS. 2rj3 " Analytical Arrangement,'' in comparison with those as to which we are eu- tirely at one with him. Our mutual difTerences are but as •' a drop in the bucket.'' Why almost even allude to them ? We are both rejoicing in the work of truth and m «rcy wrought out by God our Saviour. To us, given by gi-ace to believe in the divine testimony revealing the fact, death is the wages of Adam's one sin ; and to us, crediting the same testimony, eternal life is the gift of God, through the one righteousness, of Jesus Christ our Lord. Wliy, then, make any thing of mere intellectual differences? We desire to forget them. Surelv, after what has been already said, any formal statement or enume- ration of the qualities by which Mr. Roe's mind and writings, especially his present work, are characterised, woidd be superfluous. Evei-y Christian man, of competent education, who has read the Analytical Arrangement, must see as well as we do, that it is the production of one who, to eminent ability, great learning, consummate industry, sound judgment, gentle dispositions, strict impartialitj", unimpeachable veracity, and an aLnost quenchless desire to bene- fit the church of the living God, unites evangelical views of divine truth, and a deep, all pervading piety. That he is a quiet, sober, and Calvinistic, no less than decided Universalist, is to us, it will easily be credited, not one of his least recommendations. Like ourselves, Mr. Roe has been constrained, by a sense at once of duty and of love to set himself in opposition to the awfully anti-scriptural system of Universalism, so prevalent in t!ie Uiiite'l States of America. Courteously lias he been treated by the leading supporters of that system. And courteously but firmly, has he rejected all religion? association and fellowship with them.* What communion hath light with darkness ?f The Deity of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the putting away of sin, by the shedding of his precious blood — that sacrifice of atonement, in which he teas mad i a curse for us — together with our new-creation in him, through the power of his resurrection and ascension, are seen by our friend, in the light of the divine testimony it- self, as they ai"e seen by us, to be the fundamental truths of Clnustianity, God revealed in Christ alone, John xiv. 9, Heb. i. 3, Christ one with God, John X. 30, and Christ God, Matt. i. 23, viii. 3, John xi. 43, (compared with Gen. J. 3.) Rom. ix. 5, Acts xx. 28, Phil. ii. 6, 1 Tim. iii. 15, 16, iv. 10, &c. are axioms of inspiration. Where denied, what but a system of deism, more or less disguised, and more or less refined, can be substituted for them 1 Universalism, indeed, as understood by Mr. Roe and ourselves, absolutely rests on the fact of Jesus of Nazareth being God with ms, as its basis; and consequentlj', on the facts of his righteousness and life, as divine, swallowing up and supersed- ing sin and death, as human. Remove these fundamental verities and what have we lefti* Mere theories. Mere human speculations and conjectures. Notions not worth contending about, one way or another. Mr. Roe, we are aware, admires, in many respects and justly, the " Enquiries''^ of the aged and re- * The celebrated Mrs. Sherwood, one of the most gifted female writers of the present day, and a scriptural Universalist, having, by some well-intentioned, perhaps, but injudicious Ameri- can scribes, been classed witli the amiable and distinguished, but Socinian Barbauld, and spoken of, in other respects, as if she countenanced humnnita^ian abominations, found herself under the necessity, several years since, of bearing her testimony, in a very marked and decided manner against being identified with those who are systematically engaged in degrading the Lord Jesus, by assigning to him a place among his own creatures. We may mention, that the pages of this magazine have more than once been graced with the productions of tliis lady ; and, in common with all her admirers, express our ardent desire for the appearance of her long promised work on the '• Types of Scripture." t Recent personal intercourse with the talented Mr. Drew, Editor of tlie " Gospel Banner, Maine, and Mr. Hemphill, Massachussetts, diiposes us to'hope, that as there were in Sardis, "a few names which had not defiled their garments," Rev. iii. 4, so in the United States, there are several Universalists, to whom the Deity of the Lord Jesus is dear, and who iuthefact of his hav- ing put away sin by the atoning sacrifice of himself, find the sole and all sufficient basis of their hope towards God, Surely, amongst this number, must be included our excellent friend, Wm. F. Teulon, formerly of Halifax, Nova Scotia. X " An Enquiry into the Scriptural import of the words Sheol, Hades, Tartarus, and G'henna, all translated Hell, in thecommon English version." Third Edition. 6s 6d. 254 REVIEWS. spectable Walter Balfour, one unquestionably of the ablest in his day of the American Universalist body.* We happen to know also, that the works alluded to, he would like to see widely circulated in this country. But it is the scrip- tural facts insisted on by Mr. Balfour, and the clearness and energy with which he has propounded and enforced them, that our friend admire'', not the sadly defective unchristian theory in support and propagation of which they are but too commonly adduced. f The style of Mr. Roe is easy and schnlarlike. It is free from all affectation. Classical neatness and correctness are its cliaracteristics. In its luniinousness and perspicuity, it is the very reflex of the mind from which it emanates. So faultless indeed is it, and so admirably adapted to the topics which it is the medium of treating, that in reading we never think about it. This, as we had occasion to remark in another case, is the highest eulogium on style which we can pronounce. Few of our readers, we suspect, will be disposed, with the scriptures by their side, to peruse, and examine carefully and critically, the Analytical Arrauf^ement from he:;inning to end. To such as do so, however, the exercise will prove to be eminently self-rewarding. The majority will keep it by them to be used occasionally as a book of reference, like a Dictionary or a Concord- ance. A pretty constant reference to it, we would recommend. Looked into frequently with care and attention, immense benefit will be found to be the result. Can we wind up this notice more appropriately, than by quoting the neat and elegant language employed by the author himself, when concluding his preface ? " Order is in itself beautiful and grateful to the mind, and it also possesses a util- ity beyond itself as an assistance to a clear and easy comprehension of the matter concerned • so that, according to the degree in which the order of the ideas, or our perception'of that order, is in any composition, clear or confused, in the same degree is the sense itself, or our perception of the sense, conveyed under it. Hence an analysis of the order becomes an analysis of the sense, and a display of the order, a display of the sense ; and as the Inspired Writings exceed all others, both in their importance and their execution, the application to them of such analysis, and such display, must be proportionably useful. Mr. Boys, in the portions of Scripture which he has arranged, first exhibits the corresponding parts in such visible form as to be obvious at a glance ; and then subjoins, in similar form, a summary of their respective topics. It is a common practice to write metrical compositions in this manner for the purpose of shewing both the species of verse and the order of their recurrence ; and, if this is advantageous in the case of sound only, how much more so in that of the sense ! It is indeed only so far as tliis process is mentally per- formed that a single sentence can be understood ; and, thoiigh this may be suificient on all common occassions, yet, in the case of the Bible, in which every word has weight, and in which the correspondences pervade every part, with unequalled regularity, variety, and beauty, every possible help is desirable. In short it may be iustly considered as the most effective instrument that has yet been put into our hands ; that it is capable of turning the scale on most doubtful questions, doctrinal or critical ; that by its means the reader often obtains, from bare inspection, a clear- er and more comprehensive view of a subject, than from long and elaborate Com- mentaries ; that he is often led to inferences and reflections, which otherwise would never have occurred to him ; and that, till an arrangement agreeable to it of the entire volume of Scripture is completed, we shall not make the nearest possible approach either to the best translation, or the most correct interpretation. The correspondences indeed arc so much disguised in tlie authorized translation, by its "Three Enquiries, l.into the Scriptural Doctrine concerning the Devil and Satan ; 2, The ex- tent of duration expressed by the terms, Olim, aion, and aionios, rendered everlasting; and 3 The New Testament doctrine concerning the possession o( Devils." Third Edition. /s. '* Mr Balfour is a native of St. Ninian's, near Stirling in Scotland; and was at one time numbered among the pupils and preachers of the late excellent and devoted Mr. Robert Haldane, formerly of Airthrey, afterwards of Auchingray. ,,,.., . a + Sometimes we have been inclined to hope, that Mr. Balfour, although the companion and abettor of American Unitarian Universalists, is not altogether of them. Symptoms ot love to the simnle gospel of Christ crucified and glorified as having saved us by the sheddmg of his precious blood from the curse of the law, are visible in his writings, as well as in his private communica- tions. O that he would, before quitting this earthly scene, speak out plainly his sentiments m favoiiiof Christ's Deity ! AVe cannot hulp loving the man. RKViiiws. 255 want of conformity to the originals, and j by its incongruous division into chapter and verses, as to contribute, witli other inveterate causes, to the mistaken views which almost universally prevail. I trust, however, it will be allowed that so much progress is made towards the removal of these evils, aslcaves little more to be done. All the primary divisions of the Sacred Writings are exhibited ; and, though sub- division is not everywhere carried to its lowest degree, it is generally done where the importance of the subject made it desirable. Subsidiary matter is assigned to the Appendix and Notes : that of the former relating to the text, translation, topics, and system of references essential to a complete aiTangenient of the whole Bible; and that of the latter chiefly to the correspondences, showing their application to the solution of difficulties. I have not indeed confined myself to this line of proof; and in the case of doctrinal questions, have thought it expedient to call in additional aid. It is feelingly observed by Lowth, afterwards Bishop, that " it pleased God, in his unsearchable wisdom, to suffer the progress of the Reformation to be stopped in the mid loay ; and the effects of it to be greatly weakened by many unhappy divi- sions among the reformed." Sermons and other Remains of Robert Lowth, D.D. p. 78. This implies the retention of as much error as had been renounced ; and it was even so. Many and great errors have not only been retained, but have been so deliberately fortified and perpetuated by creeds, articles, and confessions, — abetted, more or less, by the arrogance of self-obtruded teachers, the submission of misplaced humility, the intermeddling of human legislation, and all the multiform seductions of wordliness, — as to make their correction almost hopeless. In the midst, however, of these accumulated evils, we perceive many sources of encouragement. A house so divided cannot stand. While, on the one hand, we see, even in England, and in the chief seats of clerical education. Popery again reviving and spreading like a pes- tilence, — these seminaries have, on the other, produced some eminent individuals, both dead and living, by whom (though with more candour than consistency) some portions cf the remaining rubbish have been removed ; and of whose authority, as argumenta ad homines , I have availed myself as often as I could. We have also the satisfaction of knowing, that the Bible is now more intelligently read by many than at any former period ; and, to crown all, we may confidently rest on the assurance of the well-known adage, — Magna est Veritas, etprevalebit. D. T. Le Recueil CathoUque, Par L'Abbe' C. Massiot. E fide spes. Premiere Annee, AvrU. Paris. Aux bureaux de I'Eclio de la Presse, 1 et 3 Bou- levart des Italiens. On s'abonne a Londres, 7, New Coventry Street. Cases of Conscience, or Lessons in Morals ; for the Use of the Laity. Extracted from the Moral Theology of the Romish Clergy. By Pascal the Younger. London : Thomas Bosworth, 215, Regent Street. 1851. To the polite attentions of Henry Drummond, Esq., M.P. we owe the oppor- tunity of reading, and bringing under the notice of our subscribers, the above named pamphlets. Both we have found to be most interesting and instructive, and both make their appearance most seasonably. The " Kecueil Catholique '' is, indeed, one of the characteristic phenomena of our extraordinary age. As an appeal to Roman Catholics, by one of their pi-iesthood, it takes its place beside the " Orations" of the Barnabite Gavazzi. The Abbe Massiot, its editor, for twenty years a talented, eloquent, and im- pressive preacher among the llomanists in France, — who, in fact, scarcely a twelvemonth since, was in the habit of addressing numerous and delighted audiences, assembled for the purpose of hearing him in the Churches of i^aris — is now, partly by force of circumstances, and partly by his own voluntary- act, separated from his former communion. He has opened, at iSo. 36 Rue de I'onest, Paris, a chapel for the performance of divine worship. Two circumstances are particularly remarkable in the man, and his secession : first, that although no longer an adherent of the Church of Rome, he disclaims having become a Protestant, or intending to become one, glorying in the name of Catholic, while he repudiates the prefix Roman ; and, secondly, that in the step taken by him he seems to have the sympathy, and to a certain degree, the support and cooperation of many of his clerical brethren. Who can say that this movement on the part of the Abbe Massiot, may not be the germ of most glorious results ? 256 REVIEWS. In this April mimber of the Recueil, we find contained: \, Mon jnemier mot, my first word ; 2. Conferences on the origin, basis, and constitution of the Catholic Church; by Mauger-Carre ; 3. Eludes Evangeliques, anO, 4. topics of meditation, addressed to the clergy. All are excellent. Under the head of Evauffelical Studies, Massiot's observations on the Gospel according to Si. Matthew, have particularly attracted and captivated us. Simple, beautiful, interesting, and, upon the whole, scriptural, the)- are. There is nothing Socinian about them. Perhaps, occasionally, rather too scholastic, (for our taste, at least,) in their statements and definitions. And yet, even in this respect, far more scriptural than the ordinary nm of Protestant comments on the doctrine of Christ s Deity. Judging from an expression or two, are we mistaken in supposing, that Universalism is not exactly held by him in ab- horrence ? To the general tone of his remarks, as well as to particular phrases occurring towards the close of the third article, we allude, in thus speaking. Altogether, with much from which we dissent — especially as regards his Millennarian notions — there is still more in the Recueil, to which we can give our hearty concurrence; and the very fact of the appearance of such a work in France, positively delights us. Godspeed thee. Abbe Massiot. "The Christian Ambassador,'' the great Universalist newspaper of New- York, has, we perceive, had Massiot and his Recueil brought under its notice, by A. Coquerel's "i(? Lion.'' A very long and interesting account of the April number of the Recueil, from the pen of our friend, Balch, appears in the " C. A.'' of July 12. His information concerning it seems to have been derived solely from Coquerel's article. So powerfully has it impressed Mr. Balch, tliat he expresses a strong wish to have an opportunity of perusing the work for himself.* — When he comes to see it, he will discover in it none of the Rationalistic and Deistic tendencies, which so disfigure the works, and have proved so detrimental to the movement of Ronge and his associates in Germany. Those grand and fundamental truths in which evangelically taught men in all ages have rejoiced, and for which some of them have con- tended even to the death, Mr. Balch will find Massiot asserting with won- derful simplicity, power^ and Christian unction. " Cases of Conscience'' is a brief, but powerfully and 2iungently written tract. To the Protestants of England, it makes some startling disclosures. Stinging its facts and reasonings must be to Roman Catholics, and their abettors, the 'I'ractarian party. How awful — how debasing — the morality, which Jesuits are engaged in inculcating and propagating! There is not much, except in the facts, that is original in this work. Jesuitical morals, the same for substance now that they have all along been, were exposed to the scorn and detestation of mankind, two hundred years ago, by Blaise Pascal, in his celebrated and world-widcly circulated, " Provincial Letters." With these, in point of genius or power, no man in his senses would ever for one moment dream of comjiaring the work now under review. But, nevertheless, " Cases of Conscience" possesses great merit. Of the truth of Pascal's statements, it furnishes a confirmation. And to his splendid book it may be added, as a fitting supplement. Clearly does this opportune, clever treatise of Pascal Jun., (is this a wo?« de guerre of Mr. Drummond.'') establish it as a fact, that in whatever other respects Jesuitism may have changed, (query, has it changed .') since the middle of the seventeenth century ; it is still, as from the commeneement of its existence it has been, the slave of the papacy, the enslaver, as well as perverter of men's consciences, the inculcator of a nefarious morality, and the constant although insidious foe eqiually of God's word, and of man's real and permanent happiness. D. T. * Will dear Balch take a hint? he is both an ahle man, and a good scholar. But he is some - times rather careless in his style. Cap.-ihle we know he is of translatinf; French into English well ; and therefore, the next time he sits; down to the task, we trust to see from his pen some- thing more accurate and idiomatic, than the English version of C'oquercl and Massiot's French which appears in the number of the '■ Ambassador" alluded to. THE UNIVEHSALIST, NOVEMBER, 1851. AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY RESPECTFULLY AND HUMBLY SUBMITTED TO THE CONSIDERATION OF CHRISTIANS. (Continued fro7n page 2S6.) I HAD no opportunity of knowing how this sanctification, or perfec- tion as it was and is indifferently styled, manifested itself in daily life, for I never saw this man except on such occasions ; and I have no doubt whatever, that both my parents, though they believed the man, would have had a very decided objection to my being much in his society — in it at all, indeed, except at religious gatherings. Whether they really believed that he was a sanctified man, I have no means of knowing, but I am sure they believed he thought so. There were many others, especially women, who were sanctified ; and the number was very much increased at times called " revivals," which occurred every now and then, no one could tell how, and whose law of manifestation was as mysterious as that of cholera or potatoe- blight, or mesmeric influence. But these '' revivals " did and do still fre- quently occur, and while the " times of this ignorance" last, will occur. And when they do, strange things become common — so strange that thousands of Englishmen would not believe if they were told that such things exist among us. We laugh at winking Madonnas, and the whole class of Popish miracles, and very properly so ; but let us speak quietly about them, and never with forgetfulness of what is passing in the next street, or the adjoining village, in the chapel — for if we will take a little interest in what does pass in the " religious world," (a very unchristian world by the way), we shall hear and see things as odd in their way as bleeding pictures and miracle-working maidens. There was a peculiarity about these revival sanctifications and justi- fications, viz. that most of them were of short duration. I was strangely puzzled often to see persons who had been "awakened " and "justi- fied " at such times, turn out to be much the same sort of men and women as before, at the next village fair or wake. Yet this was quite common, so much so, that the quiet, staid portion of the society had little confidence in them till they saw how they passed through the temptations furnished at such seasons. There was always however a reason for such defections ; for while all allowed that some might have been deceived, yet they maintained against all opposers that the majority of the " conversions " and "jus- tifications," and " sanctifications " were real, but that the subjects of these changes had all made a further change and " fallen away." The number of "backsliders " accordingly was always very great. Yet as any blessing could be lost, nay, as you yourself, the said sanctified- VOL. II, 2 N 258 AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY and-made-perfect-brotlier might be lost, and that altogether, entirelj'^, and for ever, what couM you say ? What indeed could any one say, except that the heart was very deceitful ; that ihe devil was wonder- fully subtle and ingenious ; that it was really a very sad business — and made another cup of tea very refreshing ? And to say the truth, that was the sort of refreshment to which such " times of refresh- ing " (as they themselves called them) generally tended, and in which they most frequently ended : when I was often struck with the fact about which there could be no mistake — that these same persons, who had been for an hour or two quite inspired, came to themselves again, and were just in all respects the very same as before. I often won- dered whether the one had any influence over the other, and detected myself enquiring whether there was any afilnity between the one inspi- ration and the other ; and which was the real inspiration — that ot the tea with its concomitants, or that of the converting the believer or " member "-manufacturing-inspiration which preceded it. And some- times, child as I was, I went back to New Testament narratives in thought, and as I sat listening, was half-unconsciously comparing and wondering, with a shudder at the thought lest it should be sin, how the Apostles got on without tea, and whether the work of their revivals was as hot and thirsty as that of these. Now let any one judge whether a boy of twelve years old was in the best school for learning the religion of Jesus Christ. Whether in fact this was the society which a thoughtful, sober-minded parent would choose for his child — nay, whether such a parent would feel quite at ease to know his child was in it at all. And yet many pious, many sober and thoughtful parents not only allowed their children to be in it, but were glad to lead them there, for though it was not exactly what they could wish it, yet they thought nothing but good could be learned, even from those who had but just left the ranks of the wicked, and could hardly be said really to have left them, since many were not long before they returned to their former place and associates. But even by those who remained among the followers of Christ, as they believed them, and of whose conversion humanly speaking, there could be no doubt, the truth was certainly not declared as it is in Jesus ; nay, though there was much that was true, yet it was so blended with what was false, the light was so colored and obscured by the medium through which it passed, that a young learner was in no small danger of being quite misled, and being left to himself to ponder over what he had heard, of framing for himself a system, which nominally Christian, should in its working be as opposite to Christianity as heathenism itself. So at least I found it. I am quite certain that many of t'lem were sincere — that they lived in the system to which they had attached themselves — their whole hearts being given up to it, and their lives testifying by their purity and consistency to the singleness of their purpose and the integrity of their souls, but the circumstances under which they had become religious, the very narrow divinity of their school, made still narrower by their own partial knowledge of it, and ])y their misunderstanding and their misapplication of what they did know, rendered them very dangerous guides of the young under any AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 259 circumstances ; but when the young happened to be of a thoughtful, contemplative cast of mind, better informed than themselves generally, and especially when they happened to be scrupulous and sensitive, over-anxious if possible to be right, and morbidly afraid of being wrong ; when they were bashful, retiring, somewhat moody, and much given to musing, then, and in all such like cases, their guidance was worse than no guidance, and their teaching was actually poisonous. I listened to all I heard attentively, and tried to act upon it. The habit of introversion and self-questioning was imperceptibly acquired where meetings were almost daily, and the business of the meetings was free, unfettered public speaking, each about what was passing within him. Like the rest I began to watch the emotions of which I was conscious, and to class them as well as I could. I soon found that I could not truthfully class them according to the method I was in the habit of hearing : with all my efforts (and they were deeply earnest) to do so, I could not " lick them into" the " standard shape." I acquired the notion which I fancy was and is common among them, that all religious feelings were inspired, and must for that reason be moulded alike and manifest themselves by the same symptoms in all. Accordingly I deemed my eternal welfare to be suspended on my being enabled to feel and to express myself just as the rest. The routine (if I may so call it) was unvaried ; the awakening, the suffering, the struggling, the internal agony which many felt, and deep sorrow which all felt ; the crying, the tears, the ceaseless praying ; and then the being " set at liberty " at once, a conviction being at the same time granted by God, that He had at that instant pardoned and accepted them; and this succeeded by "visitations" and daily "seasons" of sometimes one and sometimes another kind, and in many instances by the " sanctification " before mentioned. Almost the same terms too were used by all in the accounts of their experiences. This uniformity perplexed me greatly. 1 was young, ignorant, and a mere child. But when I tried to feel great sorrow for sin — when I wanted my heart to be so broken on account of it that I could not rest— when I wanted convictions and terrors, and sleeplessness and horrors, and prayed for these things, and waited, anxiously expecting that they would come into my heart just then as I prayed — and when I was disappointed and nothing came, and all seemed nothing, and my prayers were nothing, and God and my soul seemed nothing ; and my shut eyes ached, and my young knees ached, ay, and my young he art too — when my prayers and my feelings, and God, and Christ, and %e Holy Spirit — the whole Trinity which I tried childishly to realize — and heaven and all things but my wicked heart, dull and unfeeling as I felt it, melted into an indisdnct, misty bewilderment, Oh ! then was agony, such as one so young ought not to have known. (To he concluded in our next.) '260 THE TRUE GOD KNOWN ONLY AS HE HAS REVEALED HIS CHARACTER IN HIS WORD. The God of the Scriptures is, in their own words, characterized as "a just God and a Saviour." It is the object of the whole of these records, in one way or other, to exhibit him as such, but more especially to reveal this, his character, as displayed in the work of Jesus Christ. From beginning to end they pohit more or less directly to the work of the Messiah, — his sacrifice for sin and his victory over death. Of old his prophets " testified beforehand of the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow;" and since he ascended into heaven his apostles have proclaimed God's justice satisfied by his sufferings, and his grace or mercy now abounding unto eternal life. The death and resurrection of Christ are inseparably connected ; if he had never died he never could have risen from the dead ; if he had had no occasion to rise he would have had no cause to die. But he had to raise man from earth to heaven, and for this purpose he graciously was pleased to descend from heaven to earth. In the work of Jesus Christ God is seen at once perfect in justice and unbounded in mercy. By his obedience unto death the utmost requirements of God's righteous law were fulfilled, justice was satisfied, its demands were complied with, and its highest claims exhausted. Now mercy shone forth in its glory ; unfettered and unrestrained, it was now proclaimed as bestowed freely and unconditionally upon those who stood in need of it ; and that Being, the manifestation of whose character had hitherto commanded man's highest approval, now claim- ed his warmest love. No one of the attributes of the Almighty as revealed in the Scrip- tures is incompatible with another; their manifestation has been progressive, but their developement has brought to light no inconsisten- cies. In the course of his providence he has brought under man's notice attributes previously unknown or unobserved, or has made clear and prominent what aforetime had been hidden and obscure. At any time man knew the true God only as he had revealed himself, and thus only he knows him now. And as his attributes are all exer- cised in complete harmony with one another , we cannot declare his ti-ue character if we set him forth as one who exercises one attribute at the expense of another ; neither can we, if even by our mode of declaring it, we suggest that he may do so. Yet men are ever prone to do so, ever ready to improve upon God's revelation of himself by additions or glosses of their own. He has re- vealed his true character in those glad tidings which tell men that he hath sent his Son into the world to save sinners ; that through him is proclaimed unto them the forgiveness of *sins. The Scriptures con- stantly connect salvation with an atonement for sin ; they represent this as now made and accepted, — all that was necessary to satisfy the demands of God's law finished, — salvation now his gift to whomsoever he will. It is God's purpose to save entirely and unconditionally — the guilty : these things are ever kept in view, that those he saves are guilty, and that this salvation is entirely his gift. Any supposed improvement in the statement of the gospel keeps one or other of these THE TRUE GOD, ETC. 261 things more or less out of view, and is in reality a perversion or cor- ruption. No alteration or improvement is required or can be admit- ted : the scripture statements express all that is intended, and express it fully ; they declare the greatness and completeness of God's work, and they proclaim it to those who are its proper subjects, — the guilty children of men. The New Testament, Covenant, or Arrangement is a dispensation of mercy, a revelation of God's grace or undeserved favour to beings who stand in need of it. The Old Covenantor Arrangement was ostensibly one of justice ; in it God's purposes of mercy were veiled under types and figures. Laws were given to men and violated ; punishment was therefore incurred, the inevitable award of justice. From this justice could indicate no means of release. The lawgiver required obedience, but he had got only disobedience. To have by a mere act of power restored the criminals to their first position or given them a new one and perpetuated it unconditionally would have been an imputation on the wisdom of his first requirement : he had tried one plan — to bestow blessings as a reward : but it had failed, and he had now recourse to another. In this man could I'ecognise his goodness, but it would be at the expense of his wisdom ; moreover it would have been simply a new display of goodness, not a new exhibition of a n attribute, that of mercy. But it was not so ; the Son of God came, became man, and satis- fied all the requirements of the lawgiver, yielding perfect obedience, loving the lawgiver and loving his law. Nay more ; he took upon himself the sins of men and underwent their punishment, dying the just for the unjust ; he satisfied and exhausted all the demands of the righteous judge. He obeyed his laws and deserved life ; he volun- tarily underwent the punishment of disobedience and sacrificed that life. No imputation now could rest upon the wisdom of the divine requirement ; obedience had been demanded of and had been yielded by man,— the man Christ Jesus ; but its reward was sacrificed by his taking upon himself the punishment due to disobedience. The Son of God had accomplished the work for which he had be- come man, and now assumed his character as Jehovah the Saviour. Now he could bestow mercy on the guilty. It was not now one plan abandoned at the expense of an imputation on God's wisdom, and another substituted as a new display of goodness. But it was God's righteousness and wisdom indicated by the carrying out of his plan to a full and perfect consummation ; and a new plan disclosed for the pur- pose of displaying a new attribute, — love in a higher form, — mercy, or goodness to the undeserving. God now appears, not as a benevolent and righteous ruler who gives men the blessings they deserve, but as a beneficent and compassionate Father who bestows blessings on the guilty, immortality on the dying. Only those who know him in this relation know the true God. " He that loveth not, knoweth not God ; for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God towards us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." He that loves not God in this relation or from this cause " loveth not" ; and consequently " knoweth not" the onrd heard and read by them had failed to accomplish, man's fictions may, without any disparagement of their power or brilliancy, despair of succeeding in. And jet, neither the un- quietness of the spirits, nor the excellencies of the poem, may be altogether with- out their me. In the stirring of the waters hy the former may, as in the case of the pool of Bethesda, reside a healing influence. And the latter may be subservient to many mo-!t important ends. Infidelity may even by poets be more and more hemmed in. Strongholds within which it has entrenched itself and deemed itself secure, they may storm. False orthodoxy they may render suspicious. Religious dotjmas received passively on mere human authority they may exp )se. Vn the scriptures of truth, for satisfaction on points which have hiilicrto been unq\iestioned, they may direct the attention of some. Spiritual illumination from the teaching-; of the inspired volmne may follow. And thu- ultimately the word of man, in itself utterly powerless for spiritual purposes, may in God's hands become the means of pointinGf to that Word, which a-! alone the sword of the Spirit, is emphatically the Word of POWER. Heb. i. 3. Is not tins sometiiing ? " Universid Restoration " or " Restitution," is not language which we are in the habit of using ; nor, as commonly iiehi, is it a d ictrine to which we have ever given our assent. It'iiy restoration is understood the replacing of mat- ters in any respect whatever on the same footing hereafter on which they stand here, or ai the selling up again of that earthly Paradise which was iorfeiipd by Adam's one transgressioi, no such things are to be found intimated in God's word. Indeed, the scriptures are throughl in 1. Eternal life is not of the nature of "a sugar plum '* held out to reward good children, but is God's gift, ffeely bestowed on the vile and undeserving. Rom. v. 8, and vii 23, Gal. iii. 6, lo the end, 1 John v. 11. Jt is never known as a favour that mat) be ours, and which we are to earn by our own endeavoiu's and virtuous actions. Rom. iii. 21, 22. Titus iii. 5. On the contrary, it is always known, where known at all, as that which as a matter of fact, is ours; or we know God, according to his eternal j)urpose, which he purposed in Christ Jesus, Epii. iii. 11. (also 1, 4, 5, and Titus i. 2, 3,) to have loved us from everlasting to everlasting in his own Son, before we are, or can be influenced by heavenly principles at all. Rom. vi. tinoiigliouf, 2 Cor. v. 14, 15. Eph. v. 1. 1 John iv. 19. Jesus Christ, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despisi/ifj Ike shame. Heb. xii. 2. And his apostles who lived before the shadowy dispensation of the law, to which the fulfilment of faith as a con- dition was essential, came to an vwd, stioyeto /at/ hold on eternal life. 1 Tim. vi. 12 ; see aho Heb. iii. 6, 14, iv. 14, x. 23. But Christ, the substanc ; of that dis- pensation, (Colos. ii. 17). is now completely revealed. Rev. xxii. 18. By him all its conditions are declared to have been fulfilled, nay to have been exhausted. Rom. x. 4, John xix. 30. In him, and interested in his righteousness and life, we are revealed lo be. Hence, eternal life is not a something which by our own righteousness of any kind we are to earn, and which we may or may not come short of; it is, through y««7A oj the opeur/ion of God, — in which is subjectivelij realized to us its heavenly and divine object, (Heb. xi. 1, 2, — Greek) — seen by us as that of whicli in Christ we are even now in possession as a matter ot fact, and of which we can by no possibility be despc iled. 2. There is no sense in which hell, or any other mere ci eature princiule Cfin be infinite. Rev. xx. 14. The inji)iite is the divine; and we think too highly of Mr. Gilfillan's sense, not to speak of his Christianity, to suppose for one moment, that to sin or to hell he would ascribii a divine attribute. He is led astray here by want of reflection. He is confounding, as is but too common, the indefinite or that which the creature cannot, bound, with the infinite or that which is boundless. Jeremiah xvii. 9, 10. Sin and death are indefifiite, not infinite principles. To assert that they are infinite is sheer Manichaeism. * Is not the hint, if not even the phrase, borrowed from Newman's " Soul?" VOL. II, 2 X SOS REVIEW?. Righteousness and life as attributes of God, and as realized in tlie work of Jesus Christ, God manifest in flesli, are liijinile; but sin and death, the worlcs o/"//(c f/c'ivV, can never, without the most arrant bhisphemy, be made itifinile likewise, and thereby raised to a level and put on a iootiiig with them. Tlieie is neither infimle sin nor injinife deatli.* On the contrary sin, as indrfnilc, was cast into the iiifinile ocean of Christ's righteousness, (Mieah vii. 19), and there swallowed up. John i. 29, Heb. ix. 29. Death, as indefinite, was cast into the infinite ocean of Christ's life, (2 Tim. i. 10), and there swallowed up. Isai. XXV. 8, 1 Cor. xv. 54, 2 Cor. v. 4. And yet we feel disposed to meet and satisfy our friend Mr. Gilfillan's ideas if we can. There are, undoubtedly, senses in which we may hold the consequences of sin to be infinite. Tliejf are in themselves merely indefnite principles, and through the atoning snerifice and resurrection of Him who is the infinite one, shewn to be so. Butthrougli sin, crea'iuve nature dies or passes away for ever. In that destruction of man, as Adam's descendant, which took place in the sacrifice of Clirist, he is, as man, everlastingly {injinitelii if you will) punished ; lor, as man, he never lives, and as new-created in Jesus, never can live again. Besides, the death of death itself, which is involved in the confeiTing of eternal life, or the swallow- ing up of death in victory, is an infinite result. Thus in virtue of God's pur- pose and the work (;f Christ Jesus, sin and death, indefinite in themselves, are rendered subservient to infinite consequences ; and man, as one with Adam, is everla.stinglij, that is infinitclij punished by being eveitaxting/ij destroyed. Will this tend to satisfy Mr. Gilfillan, by shewing, that although not on popular, yet on scriptural and divine principles, we can agree with him, and meet the objections of supposed opponents by conceding the existence ui' infinite, that is everlasting punishment? 3. We have no hesitation in admitting, that as "in every great house, there is a furnace for the dross, as well as a light for the drawing room," so does scripture countenance the applicability of language borrowed from the action of fire upon metals, to divine ami spiritual subjects. For the Lord thy God is a consuming fire. Deut. iv. 24. See Heb. xii. '19. I will — jnirelg purge awag thy drons, and fake awag all iJiy tin. Is. i. 25. ^nd he shall sit as a refiner and purifier uf silver. Mai, Hi. 3. Still, the question occurs, is the use made of such figurative language here, by Mr. Gillillan, or those of wliose objections he condescends to be the expositor, admissible^ According to tlicm while the church, or body of the redeemed is tlie everlasting " liglit in the drawing-ioom," the flames oF hell, everlastingly cojisuming and tormenting the daumed, constitute the "furnace for the dross." Besides the Miinichceism of making sin infinite, and the lie given to God's express declaration that Christ lias manifested it in flesh as the furnace, and for the puipose of being consumed by the flames of his wrath, (the wrath of him who is love, and who exhibits his love to righteousness in the form of wraih towards sin,) sin and sinners, death and dying ones are thrown. As the resnh, they are consumed. Sin and death, sinners and dying ones, are no more. OUR God, be it remembered, is a cnnsuniing fi're. Heb. xii. 29. 'Ihe dross i.s puiged — the tin is taken away. There is not, as poj;ular divinity, backed by popular infidelity sujiposes, an ineffectual struggle on the part of * Wlicre in scripture is either said to be so ? REVIEWS. 309 tlie Creator wit]) his own creatures — a vain although everlasting attempt made by Gnd to consume, and tlicicby get rid of sin and death. (Horrid and Ijlasphcinous although all but universal idea ) No. According to the scrip- tures, God does consume, and tliereby get rid of both. John i. 29. Heb ix. 23. ii. 14. 2 Tim. i. 10. Sin and death are cast into the furnace of Christ's deatli and resurrection — there they are subjected to the full and flaming action of divine love — and there thev are consumed. Evil and the effects of evil are no more. Rev. xxi. 3 — 5. The action of the heavenly fire in this heavenly crucible, has been complete. A new creation, p'u-ged from all that is debased and disfigured l)y sin, makes its appearance. "Behold! I make all things new." Ibid. xxi. 5. Say, reader, by which of these two systems, are tlie action of the furiiace, and the effects of a fire that is consuming, more fitly represented ? By tiiat one, which would make Him, in his attempts to consume sin and its consequeuces, to succeed only in confirming them for ever, that is, which would assign to liis enemies, the power of everlastingly frustrating his plans and purposes? Or, by that one, which would shew him to have, agreeably to his own word, actually consumed sin and death in Christ Jesus, after having rendered their temporary existence subservient to the everlasting manifestation of iiis righteousness and life? Surely, dear Mr. Gilfillan, the simile of the furnace, as employed by the supposed objectors, is a singularly unhappy and inappropriate one. 4. Man's natm-e, although not bodilv, yet mentally considered, is hidefnite, and sin, as properly in and emanating from man's mind, is indefinite also. Hence, the expansive nature of sin, as indefnite, is at once and cheerfully granted. And jjunishment as following necessarily in the wake of sin, as inseparable from it, and as thereby co-extensive with it, will be of course as expansive, because as indefinite as sin itself is. But what of all this? Will the utmost expansive capacity of sin, succeed in swelling the indefinite to in- finite — the creaturely to the" divine? Was the frog of the fable, with all its eff)rts, able to enlarge itself to the dimensions of the ox? Ah! dear friend, arguments from nnalojy however plausible, even those of a Butler, will avail yon and others nothing here. See how our Lord has poured con- tempt on all such arguments in Matt. xxii. 2.') — 33. No human power — no angelic power — can convert the imlefinUe of the creature, into the infinite of the Creator, There is a gulph interposed between b;)t!i which nothing creaturelv can pass. Swell, enlarge, expand the indefinite as you will, it is the indefinite after all ; and has not advanced one whit — one mathematical point towards the infinite. The highest attribute of the indefinite is, that it is the fitting, and the only fitting shadow, or representative ot the infinite. The mind of man, who was made after God's image, is the figure of, not identified with the mind of God.* Accordingly, the indefinite of sin and punishment, expand them as you will, can have bounds set to them ; and as the infinite One, lunnanuel, God with us hath by his incarnation, or coming in flesh, crossed the otherwise impassable gulph that separates between the indefinite and the infinite, so hath lie, i)y his death and resurrection swallowed up the indefinite itself altogether, withall its capabilities of expansion, whether in the shape of sin or i)uiiishment, in his own infinite, because divine righteousness and life. 5. Even if God had not " begun by abcdishing sin here,'' we cannot see how to a deeply and soundly refiecting mind, this should have presented any ])eculiar diliicidty ; seeing that ignorant as such a mind would fed itself to be of the principles' of the divine administration viewed in the infinite entireness of their applicability to intelligent creatures, it might suspect the possibility of one set of pri:ici|)les being applied to one state of things, and another set to a state of things essentially different. It miglit suppose, that while sin's exis- tence, and reign unto death so befitted earth and time, as to exclude, while * AjSuo-o-a; is the term applied in the Book of Revelation, chap. xx. and elsewhere, to tte mind of man. It is an a6;/.!s, or 6o»om/e.« pi< to man himself ; but has been gone to the bottom of, and turned inside out, by God man fest in flesh, the Lord Jesus Christ. Jerem. xvu. 9, 10, Hev. ii. 23. 810 RETIEWS. tliey lasted, the existence and reign of wliat was opposite, so the exi-tence and reign ui iisiue()u>ness unto tterniil life, to the entire exclusion of their ujjpo- sites, niiglit e(|nally befit heaven and eternity. Gamaliel-hke, — tantiou". telf- clistriisttui, and pruJent, — would such a luind evince itself to be. lint aa based on the consciousness of ignoratice, however proper and becoming in the cise supposed conduct snilable to it might he, this is not a piinciple upon which an)' one enliglitened by faith can or does act; seeing that Go;i's own express declaration of there etiteruKj into the heavenly state of tilings nothing that defileth. Rev. xxi, 27, and of all things there being vtade new. Ibid. 5, i;? to him sufficient and exclusive evidence ot its truth. Striking, indeed, is it that what we have imagined it possible fur a sound flt-shly ni nd to suspect, siiouUl constitute one of the most important siibject-matteis of divine revelation. The stale of things in time is no doubt, looked at in certain ligiits-, shadowy or eiTiblematic of the state of things in eternity. But it is more properly the ob- ject of scripture to make known to us, tlie antagonism, or opposition subsist- ing between the one state of things and the other. Here, we liave the splitre of sin and punishment ; hereafter, of righ:euusiiess and life everlasting. Worn. V. 21. But this is not all. Of His future administration of things, God has nding it, upon sonl or shadowy mind, is to liim a jjuaraniee ilnit as ahea;iy a partaker of etern.d life, Jolin iv. 24, 1 John v. 1, he cannot he hurt of the second death. K<;v. ii. 11, xx. 0. Justice satisfied here hy the infliction of deaili on the Adamic mind — death through Adam's one traMsgres>i()n, and deaili still nu>re througii the swallowing up c.f deat'i in lile, or in the knowledge of Christ living and glorified, Rom. viii. 10 — and this f(;ilovved l)y liie inflictioii of dea.h on tlieir hodits, Ihid. leaves no necessity, or p.is-ibility for tlie jtunisliment of Hell, or for sntlVrmg, to them hereafter. Sii far, then, our olijectors and we appear to he at one. And tlieie is no f;rfat diliicnity, indeed. l)y means of God's w^rd, of settling what remains. Putting out of vifW for the present, that iiighest of all rcpresfiitations of (he subject v.hich is brought under notice in Matt. xxii. .31, 32, Luke xx. 37, 38. and which an attempt has been made to embody in tlie " Summaiy*' which winds up ■' Man's 'J'hree Grand Exhibitions of Enmity to God,'" and confihing our- selves to the progressive svstem of divine truth, or that which carries ns up from {he Jiiiilc', through \he inrlrjini/i; to the infinite, — fiom the creation of the world, to the consummation of idl things — then, as in the case (jf Cluist, and of all Ujion'whom the divine nature is conferred, \\\)(m earth, justice is satisfied here, only ivio things more retpiire considerat'on — First; the application here- after ti) tlie bodies of members of the Ciiuich of the same heavenly principle which, through faith, is on earth applied to their minds, (hi earth, made to know God as revealed in Christ, tlicir souls already dead in Adam, Gen. ii. 16, 17, Eph. ii. 1, undergo the still fariiier death of l)eing superseded, in the very act of being quickened or made alive by the glorified spirit of Christ; (llom vi. 3, 4, '&c. viii. 10, Gal. ii. 20, 2 CoV, v. 1 — 4, Rev. xiv. 13); and so, wh-'n Christ comes the second time, their bodies already dead through sin or the death of s(ml, untleigo the still further death of being superseded for ever as Adamic bodies, by being quickened by Christ's spirit, and thereby conformed to his spiritual and glorified body. Rom. viii. 11, 1 Cor. xv. 49, Phil. iii. 21. Aiul, secondly, thc-ie is the application of that new-creating or heavenly principle to the rest of mankind, which had alieady been realized in the case of ttie Church. Dead in soul, and consequenfly dead in body, through Adam's one transgression, and continuing in this state during their lifetime, the life-giving power of Chri.st, when he appears making all (Itivgs new, (Rev. xxi. 5), stamps down this death upon them ibr e\ er, in tr.e very act of his applying the power of his resurrection, John v. 28, 29, 1 Cor. xv. 22, at once to both ilieir souls and bodies: superseding both for ever as old and Adamic, when he makes both new and divine. Thus are both \\\e finite and the inde- finite satisfied : \\\c finite, in the supersession of earthly body by spiiitual body ; and the indefinite, in the supersesiion of soul by spirit. And here a suggestion is made to us which explains the whole and removes every diflliculty. Looking at matters not aljxolnte/i/, but retain eli/ and piocjresiiveli/, as infinitude beloi gs to spirit which comes last, so the indefinite, as connected with the human sold, must be interposed between time, as connected with the finite, and tile everlasting and unchangeable state as connected with tlie zh_^«u'p. Heie, that is, ill the indefinite, or what is connected with soul, have we hades, or what is commonly translated hell. Tiiis like the finite, is gradually super- seded. This gradual process, however, does rot imply that the justice of God was not iiere satisfied by the work of Christ; but that what in him- self the i//^«i/e o?/e, was accomplished upon earth, is gradually manifested as accomplished also in the cases of the church and of others. It is the appli- cation and development of facts realized in Christ, according to the capa- cities of the creature mind. Jesus personallj' satisfied and exhausted the _^«//e, when he died on the cross; and so likewise did he satisfy, or exhaust the indflfi lite, hy \v\s descent into Ha'les, its appropriate region. But as to man 313 nKViEws. and man's nature, hoth finite and indefinite still remain. The ending of the one, or of the finite, implying the supersession of time and eartli, by the period and state of Christ s teonian reign, or of the infinite in its indefinite form. And the ending of the other, or the indefinite, implying the superses- sion of the indefinite itself by the infinite. The whole, however, being merely indicative of the fact, that upon earth, and in the work of Christ as dj'ing, descending into hades, and rising again, justice has been satisfied. 7. No one acquainted with the gospel ever yet attempted to frni^e an}' hook be it hiim:m composition, or be it t ;e Word of G;)dits9lf, to be divine. Proof implies the existence of something clearer than that which is to be proved, — of some evidence more satisfictory, than the conclnsion which it is our aim to establish. In luinian things proof is fair and legitimate, seeing tliat there are some things which are clearer and more sati^ifactory than others ; nay, it is indispensable, as must be obvious to all who know the principles of matlieniati- cal science, or have observed the proceedings in a Court of Justice. IJnt in divine things proof is inadmissible. These carry their own evidence in them- selves. They consist of divine facts ; and when these facts are divinely revealed through faith in their written record, to the conscience of any one, they are seen to be divinely true, that is, to be what they are, not by proof from with- out, but in their own light, and by means of the conviction of which the_v themselves are productive. I receive not testimonii from mnn. said the Son of God, while in flesh. John v. 34. " We as directly emanating from him who r< li()lit, and in iihom is ?io clarkness nt nil, 1 John i. 5, and as consequently essentially liglit in ourselves, cannot be testified to or proved, by the darkness of tlie human mind,'' is tlie import of tlie language of the heavenly and divine records. Hence, where faith, or the conviction produced by divine testimojiy exists, it is the result, not oi proof, (that is, proof from icilliout, and from what is nccessnrilij inferior,) but of the facts themselves revealed, or of God himself shining into the mintl througli the instrumentality of these facts. In faitli itself, that is, in the objects ot faith revealed or believed in, is to be found the tXi'y;i^t)i or evidence of tilings not seen. Ilcb. xi. 1.* Only therefore, where i'aitli is, can the power and force of this heavenlv evidence be felt and re- cognized. And thu^ posit irefij considered, conviction of divine truth is matter, not of proof, but of failti.j- Not so, liowever, negaticeli/ considered. The Scriptures, altliough, as the record of divine facts, themselves the clearest and most satisfactory of all evidence, and consequently incapable of being proved, nevertheless set disproof at defiance. Books falsely pretending to be divine revelations, such as the Shastras, the Koran, and the recent Mormon delusitm, may Ijo and have been disproved. The true revelation never can. Attack it wlio may, it will alwavs come off uninjured and victorious. The viper may gnaw the file, but it will be only to his own disadvantage. Celsns, Porphyry, and Julian, in former, and Herbert, Toland, Tindal. Paine, and a host of others in more recent times, have tried their power in tilting it against the Scriptures. But, as the result, their spears have been shivered to at(n"ns, and God's word still stands forth in all its piinii ivc and resplendent beauty. J To prove the Bible to be divine, tlierefore, no intelligent ami scripfurally taught * Verse 2nd s-hews this. For by U, faitli, were tlie Elders tvUncsscd to, i.e. through faith did the objective divine testimony Ijeconie subjectively a testimony to them. t See Hume's Essay on Miracles, towards the close. Hume, whose metaphysical acuteness has seldom b?en equalled and never surpassed, saw clevrly that the human, never could prove the dinitie. Thus, nugalivelii, his writin.^s have been of essential service to the Christian cause. Jlis insinuated conclusion as to the non existence of divine revelation, we, who have had the facts of scri|)ture revealed to us in their own divine lifilit and evidence, can afford to laush at. X Here appears the true use of wliat have been most absurdly denominated " Evidences of Christianity," as if Christianity could have any evidence except itself. Justin Martyr in his dialo- gue, Grotius in his treatise De Veritate RcliRionis Christian.T, Campbell in his work on Miracles. andWatson in his " Apt)lof.'y for Christianity," and in that " for the Bible," miRht confute, and actually have confuted much cr.or ; bringin;; to lisht a number of most interesting facts tend- ing to the discomfiture of infidelity. Nay, in such works as Leslie's " Short Metlind with the Deists," and Paley's " Horae Paulinre," infiiels have absolutely been pushed into a corner. The truth and divine origin of scripture, however, are manilestert to the mind, not by such compositions as theirs, but through the medium of scripture itself. REVIEWS, 313 Christian attempts. This he knaves to its divine author as liis own inalien- able prerogative; and knows that lie has in every age been accomplishing if, by causing its facts to appear to be what they are, or by revealing tliem in tlieir own hght and heavenly simplicity to the members of liis Church, All that man can attempt, with any prospect of success, is availing himself of the liijht oF scripture, and making use of its revealed facts as grounds and hiiecliu of proof, to repel ass\ults made on divine revelation, and to convict of error those by whom the assaults are made. Confining himself to this lino of con- duct, his labours are important and may by the divine blessing be preeminenily iiseful. He may be the means of drawing attention to many mistakes which have been committed as to the meaning of God's word, and of exposino' and confuting many errors into which men following the guidance of their dark and corrupt minds have been led. In all this, however, he is doing nothing which has the slightest tendency (yi/-ef.//^ or ^jOAfV/'w/// to establish divine truth. He is merely, as having had that truth revealed to himself, enabled negulicel to refute liuinan error. God's truth is contained in God's word alone; and God dircctlij and poxilively establishes that truth in the mind of any one, not by proof or evidence, froin man, and still less by di>proof of human fallacies, but simply by revealing or making knowti its divine facts as what they are, in their own proper light, and by means of their own proper evidence. In this plain, unpoetical, and yet scriptural way, do we reply to the objec- tions of Mr. Gilfillan, or rather of those of whom he here comes forward in the character of spokesman. The assumptions on which they proceed are all false. Eternal life is not a reward, (a mijar plum /) but a gift freely be- stowed, and presently enjoyed — inili finite is the highest attribute of mere creature nature, as nothing but what is divine is or can be hifimle and eler- nal — God's furnace for dross, the death of Christ, does not make an attempt to con-nme it which is eternally frustrated, but actually does consume it — the expansive character of punishment, v>'hich is coextensive at the utmost with the indefinite nature of sin, is bounded by the infinite nature of him, by whom sin and death have both been destroyed — the abolition of sin by divine righteousness is begun upon earth — justice being satisfied in man's sufferings and death, and exhausted in the cross of Christ, there is and can be hereafter no hell, or place for the satisfaction of justice by creatures, in the popular sense of the term — and the Bible is not proved by human reasonings, but manifested in its own light and by its own evidence to be divine. In all this we do not profess to he establishing divine truth. That we leave to God himself to do, through his word. But we profess to have knocked down the assumptions of Mr. Gilfillan's objectors, as having shewn that they are in- consistent with fact ; and having destroyed the assumptions, we of course overturn the conclusions which are founded on them. The alleged ^rounds of opposition to Universalism, founded on by our autlior, are inadmissible. Other arguments, therefore, must be sought for. For iVIr. Bailey's religious sentiments, as a whole, we offer neither vindica- tion nor apology. We should feel that we insulted a man of his genius, and one so thoroughly competent to defend himself, were we to attempt to do so. His Festus stands unique in its plan, its object, and its execution — it has by the gorgeous exuberance of its imagination, drawn towards it the admiration of the civilized world — and as a poem, how^ever profound and metaphysical it may occasionally he, it disclaims being obliged to answer queries, which rriight fitly enough be addressed to the author of a professedly thedoc^ical disquisition. Well does Mr. Bailey know, that in so far as polemics are°on- cerned, poetry of any kind is but "the milk and rose-water" of literature- and that it is not by "dropping these on the iron scales of scepticism,'' that its assaults are to be overcome, and its existence destroyed. He merely claims the ordinary privileges accorded to his art, of dealing in fiction and exaggeration as largely as he pleases — of at the utmost eprinJcliiig truth {xpargtre voces), as he passes along his way — and of not being ameiiabJp to 314 REVIEWS. the tribunals of strict liistorical fact, and dry, hard, unbending logic. But although we updertake not the defence of the poet or his poem — that moninnctihiin acre pcrenniiis which the genius of Mr. Bailey has erected — we have undertaken to repel assaults on the truth of God, made through the sides of both. 'l"o repel assaults, we sa}', not to convince the assailants. JJ'c bvlieve in the I'lchuf Gud, ivJ.o is //le Sarioiir of ail mcti, enpeciuUii of tliem that belierr, says an inspired Apostle. 1 Tim. iv. 10. Universal Salviition then, is a fact revealed by God, not a theory invented by man. This, with other truths of revelation, the Hydra of Scepticism assails, and would, if it were able, destroy. And with some of its modss of att;ick, in the form of queries addressed to Mr. Bailey, the author of the " Galleries of Literary Portraits," condescends to make us acquainted. Now it is perfectly true that the destruction of infidelity by mere human force is impossible; and that for any man, or set of men, to attempt it, would but be to throw " milk and rose-water " on the monster's iron scales. God alone, by his truth as revealed in his word, is competent to destroy error. To act ihe part of God then, in what precedes, has not been our object. We have merely tried to do what human beings may, namely, sluw that certain assumptions of opponents are untrue, and that certain weapons of offence employed by them are illegiti- mate. At all events, what they suppose to be acquiesced in by all, we deny. Without destroying their opposition, which it is God s prerogative alone by his truth to accomplish, we have conceived ourselves to be able to neutralize it. As the result, we force them to prove their assumptions, at the risk of disclosing moi e thoroughly the weakness of their cause ; or should they not chuse to do so, to have recom- Us and inspires it with principles of action ; in both alike it robs death of its sting, destruction of its terrors; to both alike it imparts principles on which to act, whether they be commanded to build an ark, or called upon to attend to the precepts given them for their guidance, and by walking worthy ot the calling whereby they are called, glorify Him who hath bought them with a price. And if Dr. C. or others urge that there seem to be many " whose understandings are well informed in the whole of the Christian doctrine, and convinced of the truth of every portion of it, who yet give too palpable evidence of their being still unrenewed," we have only to say such seems to be the state of their minds; and though probably we should not look exactly for the same kind of evi- dence of the new mind as Dr. C. does, yet in jiroportion to the inconsistency between their principles and practice, should we doubt the sincerity of their profession, or deplore the ignorance and error displayed in the misapplica- tion of their principles. When principles are only propounded through doctrinal statements, there will ever be a risk of producing a merely specu- lative profession, an ability to talk about a system ; and it is only when prin- ciples and precepts are taught concurrently, — principles elucidated as the means of regulating practice, and precepts enforced as calcidated to suggest and strengthen principles, that there can be any true teaching at all. This is the scriptural method of teaching ; anything else is merely talking about a system and leads only to a barren profession. This is the only way in which truth can be taught by human agency, so far as it can be so taught ; and any attempt to improve or supplement it by proclaiming faith as an act of the mind, making oilers of mercy, urt!;ing gospel calls, or thundering warn- ings of coni'emnation, only manifests dissatisfaction with the way in which God reveals his character, and cxhihits men as attempting to improve \\\nm this by perverting ;his testimony, substituting appeals to the hopes and fears, desires and dispositions of men, instead of trusting to the power of God, whose word, notwithstanding all that men may do against it, or f.dsely for it, will not return unto him void, but shall accomi)lish that which he pleases, and prosper in the thing whereto he hath sent it. ^ ' i i EKDIKALETMES. REVIEWS. 323 hJaranatha. In connexion with the Future History of the Jewish Nation. Inscribed with much affection and respect to the Writers on Prophecy of the present day. Cy Jane Ussher Hocbs. Dublin : John Robertson, 3, Graf- ton Street. Simpkin, Mar.shall, and Co. London. 1839. The True Church: shewhuj ichat is the Tr%ie Church; the Ingathering of the Jews to the Church; in tvhat manner and when; the course of the Church; the past, the present, and the future. By James Biden. London : Arthur Hall, Virtue and Co. 25, Paternoster Row. 1S5L '' Again— again— again,'' is a line which, strong in its very repetition, occurs in that noble and spirit-stirring ode of Thomas Campbell, " The Bat- tie of the Baltic.'' Prodigiously simple the words are; and on that very account prodigiously wide is the range of their application. To the never-ceasing midtiplication of books, they apply with painful exact- ness. Day not more certainly succeeds day, wave not more certainly succeeds wave, than do the productioris of the teeming brain of man constantly and regularly succeed one anotlier— the one which now makes its appearance being almost instantly swept aside by the next, which again in its turn as speedily gives place to its successor. Truly says Solomon, of the mulcing of hooks there is no end. Surging up incessantly from that troubled sea* the human mind, and thrown like so many waifs on the shore of literature, are treatises on the subject of pro- phecy. So numerous for the last fifty years have they been, that lecjion is their only appropriate name. Nor at the present moment is there the slightest pros- pect of the stream of writings on this subject ceasing to (low. Labitur et iabetur. Eiglirdi gold is ready to purchase ; and where there is the demand, there will of course be the sujiply. Perfectly marvellous, and even amusing were not the subject too serious for ridicule, is the enthusiasm of writers on the subject of prophecy— is the ear- nestness with which they bespeak attention — and is the confidence evidently cherished by tliem, that the theory wliich each one of them has to propound will ere long become the acknowledged creed of all. 'J'o say that such persons are content to act as the interpreters of prophecy— great as is the presumption implied in a pretence even to this— would be to pay a higher compliment to their humility than they deserve. They actually in almost every case speak as if the mantle of Elijah had descended on their own shoulders. Disclaim this in words, perhaps, they may. But that the juror Delphicus— the insane feeling of a capacity to unrol tl)e records and unveil the face of futurity.— has seized on them, every page, every line nearly, of their absurd, self-contradic- tory, and but too often blasphemous productions, bears testimony. AH this, melancholy as it is, looked at merely in a literary point of view might be tolerated, were any thing like genius, or even variety, apparent in such compositions. To every fault, in the Republic of Letters, pardon may be coiiceded, except to sheer dulness and stupiditv. We could bear with Elliott's learned laboriousncss and industry, and Cumming's eloquent and solemn quackery, if they would only set before us something'novel — some new, even if it should not be a scriptural principle of interpretation, or some combi- nation on a large and comprehensive scale of alleged historical facts, which had escaped the notice, or had surpassed the ingenuity of their predecessors. They might have tried at least to tickle our uitelh-clual palates with some splendid exercise of tlie inventive facidty. J]ut it is rather too bad to have "changes '' on " the bells '' of eiTete systeins perpetually " rung,'' find dinning our ears, to the annoyance, if not even damage of oursense of hearing. 'J'o have nothing but our old acquaintances the Romans, pagan and papJ — the forms of Roman government by kings, consuls, dictators, decemvirs, tribiuies of the people, and emperors— Huns, Alans, Goths, and Vandals— Alarics, * Isaiah Ivii. 20. 324 REVIEWS. Theodosius', .and Theodoiics — usurpiiig Phocas', intriguing Stephens, and domineering Hildcbrands — reformation thunders and revolutionary earth- quakes — togetlier with all the rest of the hacknied prophetical wotcr'iel, con- stantly reproiluced on the stage, made to pass before us for the hundredth lime in " mo^t admired confusion," or at the utmost only slightly altering their places like queens, rooks, bishops, knights, and pawns, on a chess-board. Is there no one capable of striking out a really new path amid the tangled forest of prophetical enquiry ? Mere human novelty we are well aware, docs not of itself constitute truth, any more than the want of it necessarily indicates falsehood. But it is not with truth that we have now to do. It is wiih hiunan compositions, fundamentally erroneous both in principle and detail — human compositions dealing in tlie romance of religion. Such , we contend, are generally as dull as they are false ; and to them novelty is essen- tial, as their sole redeeming quality. Where, however, in works on the sub- ject of prophecy do wc find it? Mede we know. Sir Isaac Newton we know. Fleming and Faber we have studied. With Durham we are not unacquainted. Elhanan Winchester and Pirie of Newbuigh, we have made tt a point to mas- ter. Other eminent men in ancient and modern times, Roman Catholic and Protestant, liishops Hossuet and Walm>ley, (Pastorini), no less than Bishop Newton, men whose prophetical notions aie supposed to carry weight, we have paid all due attention to. Even minor lic;hts, such as Cooper, Bicheno, Keith, Cunningham, &c. &c. we have not altogether neglected. In all of these, with some variety cevtaiidy, we encounter systems essentially the same. As the result, we are sick of them. Nor have we found still more recent works calcu- lated to remove the nausea. On the contrary, rather to increase it. The newest works merely repeat what has been said a thousand times already witri but little variety of method and phraseology, and with still less of matter. We are getting now to homoeoj)atliic, or rather infinitesimal doses, on the siibject of prophecy : almost the only variety on which we can now count, being the extremely diluted n uure of the potions of error, that is, of the very substance of their works, wiiich it is ijOW the good pleasure of authors to mete out to us. Absence of novely — want of variety, however, on the part of writers who treat of the subject of prophecy, alihough censurable at the bar of letters, is not the ground on whicli they are objected to by the scripturally taught Christian. Their principles, perhaps rather jninciple of interpretation is false, because antagoiiislic to that which God himself has revealed. They are trying to ex- plain the divine by the hurnan, instead of having the human explained to them by God himself, in the light of the divine. Setting out from such unsound premises, no woiuler if they land themselves in vmsouud conclusiens. On a foundation of sand, what stable superstructure can be built? From the charge of having adopted for their respective starting points, principles that are un- sound, because unscriptural, sorry are we to say, that neither of the esteemed authors, whose works now claim our critical uot'ce, great as is the ability which they both display, is exempt. Hence the necessity under which we feel our- selves most reluctantly to utter, in regard to both, the language of condemna- tion. Twice have we carefully perused Miss Hobbs' book. On both occasions with feelings of the greatest kindness to herself personally, and the first time strongly prepossessed in her favour. Her open and honest avowal of Univer- salism had excited towards her our wariuest and liveliest sympathies. Her strength of mind — her earnestness of purpose — her power of encounlering and mastering dilHcuIties — her condensed and masculine style of expression — her genius even, were too manifest to be overlooked. But what of all this ? She has in her work proceeded on false principles, and the result of necessity has been a failure. Miss Hobbs, it may bo mentioned en passant, is, through her maternal grandiuother, whose maiden name was U.ssher, a lineal descendant of that great statesman and divine, as well as man of letters. Primate James Ussher, UEViEWS. 32.5 ("Usscrius iioster," aslie is jjroudly and fondly spoken of by his British and Irish contemporaries), Archbishop of Armagh, in the days of Charles I. Like many others, she is a living proof that the axiom as to the talents not being hereditary', is one that requires to be I'eceived with caution, and many qualifications. In her case it is clear, that *' the remainder of the patent '' of nature's " nobility" has not yet been " exliausted." But at the same time, in her work abundant evidence is afforded that no descent however honourable, and no abilities however great, can by any possibility convert the essentially false into the true. Her grand principle that scripture is its own interpreter, scripturally under- stood, is a glorious and fundamental truth. Understood however, as she under- stands it, it is erroneous, and the fruitful parent of errors innumerable. Several writers, such as " Ben-Ezra, Bickersteth, Beg'j, Burgh, and though last, not least, McNeile,'' (!) to all of whom the fair authoress pays the some- what ambiguous compliment of being " wise scribes who are not far from the kingdom of God," p. 7, and none of whom, except perhaps on the score of character, will be known fifty years hence,* have it seems, adopted and pro- ceeded on her principles. No matter. The /act of men of far greater abilities and of far superior theological standing — nay, on the supposition of all the men of genius in the land — having lent their sanciion to such a system, would not contribute the weight of a feather towards the establislunent of its validity. The system and tlie principles on which it rests, being unsound, what is the worth of names, authorities, character, and so on ? Why, obviously, — Nought but leather and prunello. Our friend's principle as expressed by herself is, that " prophecy must of necessity be understood by us in its plain and literal sense.'' p. 13. As to her meaning in these words, she has left us in no doubt, for she had said previously " That Zion and Jerusulem mean these places, and not the church ; that Baby- lon means Babylon, and neither Rome nor Po[)eiy ; that Edom means Edom, and not the enemies of the Ciiurch; that earth means earth, and heaven means heaven.'' p. 11. Figurative meaning she thus express!)' and of set purpose, (with certain exceptions, for which see her work), completely excludes. According to the above principle, the Old Testament scriptures both can and do explain themselves, their language being always understood literally, ex- cept in the few cases where the context furnishes either a key or an exj lana- tion, or where we are plainly told in the Nev/ Testament, what was imended under the ligures of the Old. p. 12. Now, so I'ar from the principle being (rue, the very opposite of it is the fact. No r-KoPHECY of the scriplure, that is, of the Old Testament scriptures, is of antf private, that is f>f self (ihas) interpietution. 2 Peter i. 20. One portion of the Old Testament scriptures may, and frequently does explain another, as regards temporal things, and the interior and secular meaning of types and figurative language. But «o portion of the Old Testament scriptures is capable of explainiiiff itself spirituaUi/. Over the face of Moses a veil was thrown. Exod. xxxiv. 33 — 35. So likewise was the dispensation of Moses a veiled dispensation. 2 Cor. iii. 13 — 15. Accordingly every fact and circumstance recorded in the Old Testament scriptures, besides its literal signification, in- volves also a mystei}', that is, a secret or spiritual sense; see Rom. v. 14, 2 Cor. iv. 6, Gal. iv. 22 — 31, Eph. v. 32; and thus the topics treated of in them con- stituted, as a whole, a nij/s'cri/ hid from ages and from (fenerations. Eph. iii. 1 — 11. The prophets, and holy men of God who composed these writings, so far from having been actuated by their own will, or enlightened by their own sagacity, were impelled to their pious task b}' the direct stimulus and afflatus * The Rev. AVilliam Burgh, may be excepted. How painful his eccentric and inexplicable career! Perhaps Ben-Ezra may be remembered in conne.xion with Edward Irving. 326 REVIEWS. of the Holy Gliost ; 2 Peter i. 21 ; also Psalm xlv. 1 ;* and so far, after hav- ing comitleted their work, were they from understanding the true and spiritual import of what they liad written, tliat they were exaclly upon tlie same footing as those into whose hands their inspired compositions came, compelled to search what, and what mnnncr oj time, the spirit of Christ that was in them Jitl sigiiifi/. 1 Pet. i. 10, 11. And this, with the express additional revelation, that until Clirist himself came, their researches were destined to he haffled. Tiiey wrote for the instruction of a future age^ not of their own. Ihid. 12. Now could this have happened, had they possessed that power of explaining them^^elves, wliich Miss Hobbs and her fi'iends are pleased to abscribe to tliem? Undoubtedl}', the Old Testament scriptures are divinely inspired ;+ but they have no power of self- illustration or explanation, spiritually considered. This power, God saw meet for ages to reserve in his own hand. At last lie exercised it, first, in tlie per- son, cliaracter, and work of his own Son, and in the preaching of the gospel by the Ajiostles; and then in his insjuring i)er.sons to conunil to writing the Gospels, Epistles, and other portions of the New Testament. Thus was the veil done amnij in Christ. 2 Cor. iii. 14, 16, 17. Thus by the facts revealed co\\cen\mgQ,\\xhX, had life and incorrupl.ion lifjht thrown on them; 2 Tim. i. 10;]: and were the previously dark sayings of Moses and the ])rophets, shewn to have been in exact accordance with actu;d occurrences. Luke xxiv. 2.5 — 27, 44 — 46. The Old Testament scriptures, heretofore a series of enigmas, now began to be made plain; (Eph. ii. 13 — 22); and fads to which merely a literal import had been attached, now began to assume the s])!ritual aspect of metaphors and allegories. 2 Cor, iv. 6, Acts x. 9—16, Gal. iv. 22, &c. A sealed book throughout, the Old Testament was nov/ slicwn to have been ; although in the light of the writings of Evangelists and Apostles, a sea'ed book no longer. Incapable it was, in any rcsi)ecl, of interpreting itself spiritually ; (Matt. xvi. 21, 2:!, John xx. 9) ; but capable it was of being so interpreted, by the appearance, history, death, resurrection, and ascension to glory, of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by means of the teaching of that spirit which, as gloritied§, he was pleased to shed forth on his Apostles and Disciples. What, under such ciicumstances, becomes of the plain literal sense of the Old Testa- ment scriptures, as the true means of spiritual interpretation? Miss Hobbs' false principle then is, that all the language of the Old Testa- ment is to be taken literally, except in cases where the New Testament gives an explanation inconsistent vvilh the literal sense :|1 the true principle is, that in no case whatever has the language of the Old Testament, spiritually con- sidered, a power of self-interpreiation — that in every case it is governed by the language and discoveries of the New, however incompetent we may be in our present state of spiritual ;idvanccment, to apply these — and that even in some ca^es, such as the future belief in Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah by the Jews as a nation, and the destruction of this present world, where the i>f)irifual is under certain aspects involved in and connected with the literal, our authority for thus interpreting, is not the language of the Old, but solely the language of the New Testament, Kom. xi. 11 — 26, Hebrews i. 10 — 12, 2 Peter iii. 10—13. The literal sense of the Old Testament, Miss Hobbs would erroneously, with certain exceptions, elevate to the level of the spiritual, or divinely explanatory sense of the New ; whereas the New asserts to itself, as opened up to the conscience by the Holy Spirit, the exclusive power of ex- Ijlaining tiie Old — thereby reversing Miss Hobbs' favorite axiom ; and shewing » "And what marvel? The original tliereof being from heaven, not from earth; the author beins God, not man ; the inditer the Holy .Kpirif, not the wit of the Ai)ostles or Prophets;" &c. ••Tlie Translators" (of King James' version) " to the reader." IGII. t Hacrcc yoaiph (-)io-rviU(rro(- '- Tim. iii. IG. § .lolm vii. 'S'J, Willi Acts ii ilirDiinhotit. II " Kxrept. therefore. v;licre it would e.xhihit a manifest absurdity, as that all tlie trees of the (iild should clap their hands, and the mountains leap for joij,—ot wliere, as St. Augustine ex- prebscs it, thejiafsage would seem lo command a heinous wickedness." Maranatlia, p. 13. REVIEWS. 327 that to interpret the Old Testament literally is in every case, looking at its spiritual sense, to interpret it falsely.* The Jews of our Lord's time acted upon the principle of interpreting the Old Testament scriptures literally ; and, as the natural consequence, after fre- quently ex])0.siiig themselves to the rebukes of him of whom th( se scriptures spoke, see particularly Matt. xx. and xxi., they rejected, condemned, and cru- cified him. Acts xili. 27. Pursuing the same course, and guided by the same false spirit of interprefalion, tlie Jews poured contempt on the preaching of the Apostles, put some of tlieir number to" death, stirred up against them tlie fury of the Gentile populace, and at last drew down upon themselves to the utter- most tlie divine vengeance, manifested in the destruction ot their city and temple, in the captivity and scattering of tlieir people, and in the termination of their polity. And having acted foi" eighteen hundred years on the principle of preferring the //'/era/ sense of the Old 'I'eslameiit to the spirittial sense of the New, and, therefore, continuing to reject the claims of Jesus of Nazareth, it cannot but be to their own surprise, that they now find themselves aided and abetted by parties styling themselves Christians, in the mainlainance of that grand principle upon which ihcir own stubborn infidelity is founded. The Apostles were not so fortunate as our friend Miss Hobbs has been, in finding the Old Testament scriptures to be plain and self-explanatory. Taking them in their literal sense, they were always blundering. Matt. xvi. 22, xx. 20 — 23, Luke ix. 51 — 5G, Acls i. 6. Express instructions from our Lord were required to correct and remove ihe rotions which a literal understanding of scripture had given rise to. John xvi. 12. Indeed John xvi. throughout. Agreeably to our Lord's promise, aftei his resurrection and ascension, special revelations were from time to time vouchsafed to the Apostles, as absolutely necessary to correct the mistakes into which a literal interpretation of the Old Testament scriptures was continually betraying them. x. 9 — 16, xv. 1 — 20. And only in proportion as in their minds, and in those of other converts, the h'tlcr was superseded by the spirit, did they advance, or were they capable of advancing in the genius and spirit of Christianity. See Gal. ii., indeed, throughout. 2 Cor. iii. G. The poor Ethiopian Eunuch found the literal sense of Isaiah liii. so thoroughly incapable of self-interpretation and self-illustration, and thereby so puzzling and unsaiisfacti ry, that right glad was he to avail himself of the offer of the spiritually, because New Testamently enlightened Philip, to afford him the true view ofits meaning. Acts viii. 26 — 39. The fact is, attention to the literal sense of the Old Testament, has in every age since the introduction of the gospel, led professing Gentile believers no less than Jews astray. Its evils constitute the chief bane — lie at the very root — -of what is falsely called Christianitv. Only as the veil of Moses is done away, by the shining into our hearts of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ— only as letter is superseded by spirit, — have we a right and true understanding of the Old 'J'estainent scriptures. Nearly connected Vvitb, indeed necessarily involved in the false principle upon which we have just been animadverting, is another whic!i pervades Miss Hobbs' theor)', and shines conspicuous in her publication. This new prin.ciple is, that Old Testament prophecv has principall}' a reference to, and is princi- pally fulfilled in the external historv, progress, and ultimate triumphs of Judaism, as well as of Gentile nations as subservient to those results in New Testament times ; and that the blessings of Christ's heavenly and everlasting kingdom can only be reached, through the previous re-establishment of Jews and Judaism, in their own land and in the enjoyment of their ancient privileges. Literally, according to her, and in fulfilment of the literal sense of the prophets there is to be a restoration of Jews to Palestine, a re-building of the Temple, a resumption of their offices by the Aaronic priesthood, the performance again * Any case may he excepted in which the lileral sense receives the sanction of the New Tes- tament. But, query, witliout the authority of the Holy Ghost in the Nev, could we be justilied in resting on the literal sense of the Old Testament, in any case, as having 3. spiritual import? 328 REVIKWS. of sacrifice and of other Old Testament rites and ccreuiouies, tlie revival o obsolete institutions, and tlie confeiTing upon Israel according to the flesh of the monarchy of the wliole earth. Also Bah) Ion, literally understood, is the subject matter of prophecy yet to be fulfilled, And Edom. In a word, prophecy, whether in the Old or New Testanient scriptures, except where we tiave a special assurance otherwise, i-espccts the present punishment and future triumphs of the fleshly Israel, and the subjugation under her feet externally ofall her enemies, Biniding Ujjon this principle, events as related in profane history, are looked at and classilied, and scriptm-e prophecy is interpreted by means of them ; and by means of external events which shall emeige at future periods of the world, is it anticipated that all that is now dark and mysterious in prophetical phrase- olo2y shall finally be understood. Painful and heart-sickening, as' manifestative of a spirit the very opposite of that of the Holy ScriptUies, is all this. It is admitted, that in Old Testament times, external events, in certain re- spects, and especially under the teaching of God liimself, interpreted prophecy. And it is admitted further, that as respects the appearance of our Lord in flesh, his death and resurrection, and the state of things which for forty years succeeded his ascension to glory, we have external events brought under our notice by the Holy Ghost, in which a great deal of ancient prophecy, indeed, some of its most important predictions, were accomplished. Here let the hint just thrown out be borne in nund, that for the external fidfilment of these prophecies, no less than for the previous utterance and record- in"- of tliem, we have not been left to human observation and inference, but have the express authority of the Holy Ghost himself, speaking in the Scrip- tures. Not si) circumstanced, however, are the facts, or supposed facts, observed and reasoned from, since the completion of the volume of inspiration, and the ending of the Jewish system and polity. At or about the period of the destruction of Jerusalem, A.D. 09, all miracles ended. 1 Cor. xiii. 8 — 10. Likewise all prophecy then ended. Rev. xxii. 18 19, And, as necessarily involved in these two facts, all miraculous, in- spired, or divinely infallible interpretation of prophecy then ended.* Is iAs the result, to no external historical events, since Jerusalem's destruction, can men now point, and say certainly and authoritatively to others, in these have ancient prophecies been fulfilled. For we can never be thoroughly satis- ned as to the truth and .iccuracy, as well as comprehensiveness and applica- bility of t!ie human and humanly observed facts which are alleged; and no power have men to satisfy us, by the working of miracles, that their interpre- tation is divine. Short, however, of sucli miraculous proof on the part of ex- pounders of prophecy, what is the worth of iheir expositions? iiesides how curious the procedure of almost all writers on the subject of tlie fulfilment of Old Testament prophecy, in New Testament times. The facts adduceed ar j human — tlie beings by whom they have been observed or collected are human — and tlie conclusions drawn I'rom them arc human. Now can any thing human constitute a fit basis on which, for mere man, to rear a superstructure of the clivine'! John v. 34, Matt, vii, 20, 27, Acts ii. 22, 23, xiii. 27 1 Cor. ii. 7, 8. The New Testament Dispensation is, as distinguished from tlie Old, essentially spiritual and divine in its fonn, while agreeing with the Old in being spiritual and divine in its o?vV/m and malter. It is distin- * To this fact, our dear friend Miss Hobbs seems not only to give lier assent, but upon it to found one of ber principles of the interpretation of Scripture.—" Prophecy must of necessity be understood by us in its plain and literal sense, as we have no pretensions to any thing more than a reasonable judKment and a sound mind, comparing' scripture wiih scripture " Marantlia, n 'l3 Setting aside, for the present, other objections which we have to our.iriend's statement, iiiav we be permitted respectfully to enquire, if the more fallible guesses of the human mind, such as she contends for, can ever for one moment be put upon a level with inspired pro- phocv divinely revealed to the mind, through the v-ord, by the Spirit ? UEVIEWS. 3*21) guished from tlie Old, as being antUiipicnl and fnihi/milial, wliile the Old was mcrel)' ii/p/cal and sliad(nv3\ Col. ii. 16. &c. Heb. viii, jx, x, &c. If so, then under the New Testainent Dispensation, the sliadoivy must be explained by tlie substantial, not the suhstantial by tlie s/iadounj, The OKI consists of dead forms ; the New, of living realities. John vi. 63. Gal. iv. 9, 10, indeed, tkroufjkouf.. Col. ii. 8, 20. Why, under such circumstances, waste our time, and lose our labour, in seeking the livln(/ among the dead ? Luke xxiv. 5. Who would listen for one moment to the human interpretations of tlie dead forms of the Old Testament, when the Spirit of God, speaking in the New, hath been pleased to breathe into tliese forms, and by the facts concerning Jesus and the resurrection which he hath seen meet to reveal and record, hath imparted to them a true and spiritual vitality ? See Ezek. xxxvii. 1 — 11, Heb, i, I, 2, indeed thronrjhout. And yet, alas! by Miss Hobhs, and her partj', this wondrous perversion of the iinpori; and use of tlie Old Testament prophecies is exhibited. She conceives that the plain and literal sense of the Old Testament is the true one, and that human and humanly observed facts explain its meaning : in this, led asti-ay by her ignorance of the revealed principle, that under the reign, and during the dispensation of the Messiah, that is, in New Testament times, the spiritual or the divine, made known through the writings of the Evangelists and Apostles, is the sole cause and medium of all true luiderstand- ing of the Old Testament Scriptures; John vi 63 ; Acts xxviii. 23 — 28; and that so far from hiunan ])rinciples and human events throwing light on God's word, it is only in the light of spiritual illniTiination through that word — the new portion of it explaining the old — that human principles and lunrian events can bs at all rightly conceived of and understood — that their operations can be detected, that they can be classified, that their tendencies can be apprehended, and that their grand workings and final issues can be seen to have been antici- pated in ancient prophecy. It is not human facts that explain or can explain divine prophecies ;* it is only the mind spiritually enlightened by God's word, and in proportion to the degree in which it is so enlightened, that, in the light of the divine, is enabled to see the fulfilment of God's purposes in the human. Hence, clever as Miss Hobbs' book confessedly is — indeed, perfectly mascu- line in its ideas and structure — it is, spiritually considered, crotchetty and worthless. It exhibits a human mind, setting out from certain false premises — and, under the guidance of these, stumbling at the very threshold, on the prophecies of Daniel, dreaming of the restoration of the Jews to the earthly land of their fathers, floundering in the quagmire of Satan's biography, indulg- ing fancy as to the signs of our Lord's coming, unsealing the contents of that sealed book after a human fashion, which God himself alone to the consciences of his people unseals after a divine one, and bringing us at last to an antiquated and abolishedf system of things restored on eartli, in direct opposition to that New Creation state of things, through the death and resurrection of Christ, to the earnest of which by faith God himself is introducing us on earth, and to the fulness of which he is bringing us ia heaven. The whole is a fearful specimen of the nature and results of false Tlieology, even when treated of by a person of no ordinar}' abilities and attainments. Tiius, the one false principle necessarily leads to and lands in the other. "The plain and li'eral sense of the Old Testann nt Scriptures, is their true sense." Ergo : " in the return of the fleshly Jews to their own land, in the restoration of their temple, service and priesthood, and in their future ascendency over Gentiles upon earth, we witness the fvdfilment of those scriptures." Tiie two principles certainly agree. " The cover," as Luther sajs, " is worthy of the dish." Our friend, in spite of her detei-mination to make every thing bend to the literal lense of the Old Testament, finds herself constrained, whilst prosecu- * Unless God himself be the interpreter. f Hebrew* viii. 1.3. 330 HEVIEWSi ting her wovk, iu five or six instances to admit the necessity of a totally dif- ferent mode of interpretation. This, for her own sake, is distressing. A true principle of any kind, will admit of no exceptions, (except such as are appa- rent merely), and much less a principle that is divine. We wonder that her own experience and acknowledged dilliculties — that the stubborn resistance made to her b}' several scripture facts — did not tend to shake her confidence in her assumed theorj-. Not that she stands alone in her blundering. The highest names in theology (!) — names far higher than those she has quoted, not excepting "the great McNciie'' himself — are ranged on her side. The Potters, the Mcdes, the Sir Isaac Newtons of a former, and the Bishop Newtons, the Fabers, and the Elliotts of a more recent period, all proceed (ui certain fundamental jjrinciples common to her with themselves. To external events they both agree in look- ing, as at once the fulfilment and the interpretation of ])rophccy. Human facts, either of a past or of the present age, are by ihcm obscrvetl and classilied ; and so appropriate are they — so exactly do they, as Miss llobbs and her ])re- decessors f;nicy, coincide with the language of Daniel and Jolm — that to them these sacred writers 7iiiabylon," &c. and that "the Jews and Jewish institutions virn^f- be externally restored,"' &c.) and b}' these, scripture language 7nusl be explained. At alt such things — all such vain attempts to bind down his meaning — the God of Heaven laughs'. The Babel-builders left to themselves begin to speak with diverse tongues. Sj'stem conilicls with system. Confusion is the result. Until at last all attempts of men to explain divine prophecy incur not only the suspicion of the church, but the contempt and ridicule of the world. Thorough (juacks are they iu ])roccss of time seen tobe. Mere experimenters on divine sulijects. And however loud the irnmp which they blow, and tlie success with whicli they contrive for a while to vend their nostrums, the fate of all en)pirics is ultimately their own. "Divine inversion,'' a New Testament doctrine, (Matt. xx. 16, xxii. 41 — 45, Ac.) ; also, although veiled, an Old Testament one, (Gen, Iv. 1, 2, Hebrews xi. 4, Gen. xxv. 24 — 26, Malachi i. 2, 3, Rom. ix. 10 — 13, &c ), and one of the two grand principles on whicli divine revelation rests, alone explains the opposition between the use of the Old Testament before Christ came, and its use since. External things and events, at the utmost presignifyiug and fore- shadowing internal principles, constitute the substance of the Old Testament record, and were God's method, for the time being, of teaching his character and {)in'i)oses ; now, hovvever, in the light of the New Testament alone, reveal- ing internal principles as embodied in certain leading facts, is God's character and are his pmposes to man directly taught a}id levealed, and in the light of those principles and facts alone, are the Old Testament Scriptures capable of being apprehended. Understanding to a certain degree the New, w'e are as- tonislied and delighted to find the light which is thereby thrown back on the Old, That is, it is from the inverting of the mode of divnie teaching, in New Testament times, that all our spiritual light ])roceeds. And not to the Old Testament merely is this New 'i'estameut light confined. It sheds a bright and glorious lustre on human society and human events. It illuminates them, not they it. We obtain from time to time, through the medium of its spiritiuil statements understood, more than glim])ses of the progress of events, and of the tendencies to results, which have hy the Holy Ghost been foretold in ancient prophecy. This, human events do not qu.ilify us to comprehend; but divine principles, realized in the conscience by faith, when brought to bear upon such events, contribute to do so. We begin to comprehend the human, in the light of the divine ; not the divine, in the light of the human. We say, b(;gin to comprehend. For slender, indeed, is the advance which up to the present moment, those taught of God have been enabled to make in that RKVIEWS. 331 rliviue science, the interprefation of ])rop]iecy. Enough, liowever, has been made known to us, to indicate what is the true path. And while conscious, tiiat in t!ie present state oF our spiritual attainments, our views of the fulfihnent of prophecy are extremely shallow and meagre, and tliat the spiritual and divine advancement of a future sta^e of the church shall alone qualify its mem- bers tlioroughly and satisfactorily to comprehend the whole scheme, we have seen enough of the trut'.i and value of New 'J'estament and (Heine principles, to justify us in setting aside and dispensing with mere human ones, even although they may plead in their behalf the plain and literal phraseology of the Old Testament Scriptures. " Please you, my Lord will you read a pasquil," is said to have been the contemptuous language, with which Mary of Guise, Regent of Scotland, drew the attention of the then Archbishop of St. Andrew's, to a remonstrance which had been presented to her by Knox and the other Scottish Reformers. Now, although Sliss Hobbs' religious views, as developed in her " Maranatha," appear to us to do more, spiritually considered, than merely to border on the roman- tic, yet there are no contemptuous feelings in our mind, regarding either her or them. We have no wish to hold them up to ridicule. 'I'he reverse. We are writing in sober earnest. Her treatise is a clear, terse, powerful, masterly piece of composition. Truly almost may we apply to her advocacy of the cause which she has undertaken to defend, mutatis mutandis, the hacknied quotation, 5"* Trojuhac de.vtra defendi &,'€. Still, however, her work, like the vastly more learned and elaborate one of Mede, is, divinely considered, baseless. It is an attempt to establish the false. It is a mere tissue of mis- takes, (with certain exceptions immaterial to our ])resent purpose,) from first to last. Beginning with erroneous premises, it goes on o'er hill and dale, through swamps, and quagmires, and quicksands, to erroneous conclusions. The restoration of the earthly Israel, to a high earthly state of prosperity, in the earthly Canaan, is her dream. The ele\'ation of the earthly Israel, to be members of the spiritual Israel— their introduction thereby into the spiritual Canaan upon a footing of equality with Gentile believers — and the great spirit- ual, not earthly prosperity of the church, with which this new and enlarged state of things is to be accompanied, constitute leading topics of God's word. See Romans xi. especially. Notwithstanding this decided discrepancy between her views, and those of the New Testament explaining the Old, our female friend is not without her consolation. With her, as with other parties pro- ceeding on the same principle of explaining the divine by tl;e human, aie probably 999 out of every 1000 nominal protessors of Christianity. As for us, finding that God hath spoken after a certain fashion, and hath in New Tes- tament times established spiritual, not literal principles of Old Testament in- terpretation, when God is contradicted, and principles of exposition opposed to his are set up and contended for, we are, like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, not careiul to answer in this matter. Dan. iii. 16. Our opponents we leave tj the word of God, and their own consciences. The work of Mr. Biden, to which we wouhl, in as few Wi)rd5 as po-sible, invite attention, along with some points of agreement with that of Mi>s Hobbs, presents features, in some important respects, totally at variance with hers. Mr. Biden's professed subject is " The True Church,'' or that as.-emhlage of individuals whom, according to His eternal purpose in Christ Jesus, God is in every age separating from the world, through faith in His vevealt-d heavenly testimony, and thereby introducing into His kingdom and glory. Particularly, by the true Church, in New Testament times, Mr. Biden understands the whole body of believers in Jesus of Nazareth as the long promised Messiah, whether previously Jews or Geniiles. Concerning this Church, and the blessings destined for it in virtue of its connexion with its divine and glorified haad, he understands the Old Testament scriptures to be speaking continuallv'. In the teeth of views entertained by VOL. 11. X 2 332 REVIEWS. Miss Hobbs, and the parties witli whom she is associated, he considers the prophecies of the Old Testament which foretohlJerusaiem and Judea's flourish- ing condition in the age of the Messiah, to liave received, or to be receiving llieir accomj)lishment, not in the earthly pro-.perity of the typical, but in the spiritual blessedness of the antitypicil chuich. Motions of an opposite ierience, will venture to bring his first and hurried thouglits under public notice. To rush into print, witii one's lucubrations in their ciudest form, is not properly to consult one's reputation, besides being disrespectful to those for whom one ])rofesses to wriie Ail thinking that is really protbund, and worth being attended to, implies labour in the acquisition of its materials; and, generally also, labour in its concoction, digestion, and preparation for the press. We say, generally also. For some daily writers, and some even of tiiose who brmg out works of higher pretension, and of a more pei-manent kind than newspaper articles, do certainly by practice acquire great facility in the arc of coni;)Osi- tion. They can supply their printers, whenever wanted, with what is techni- cally called ciipi/, accurately and even elegantly written. Their manuscripts, like that of the late Mr. Cobbett for instance, shall present no erasures, shall re- quire no corrections, and shall be perfect even to their very punctuation. Persons giftt-d with this power, it is to be suspected, are not very numerous. And they are rather unsafe guides to be imitated by a young author. By any author, indeed, who aims at permanent fame and abiding usefulness. Horace among the ancients, and iicusseau and lioscoe among the moderns, (to whom may be added even George Canning, orator as he was), who elaborated their compositions, and thereby recommeneled them to the notice not onlv of tlieir contemporaries, but of posterity, aie somewhat better and safer models to work after. If the)' have not always Cohbett's power, they at all events avoid his repetitions, and eternal quotation of himself. These remarks were suggested to us originally by observation of the loosetiess and desultoriness of Mr. Biden's style, but were of course confirmed by the following passage, on which we stumbled at p. 335: — "At present 1 am moie than usuaily debarred from obtaining the needful knowledge, being confined to my bed by a broken limb. ^s I prijit as Jast as I ;jet a Jew pagcx of AIS. ready, 1 do not like to stop the publkation for the wajit of this Iciiowledyc." ('I he italics are ours). Many of the defects of his book, Mr. Biden has in the^e words sufficiently and satisfac- factorily accounted for. In many parts of Australia, having no occasion for the carcajc, they are said to boil down a whole sheep for the sake of the fat alone. A large MS. treated after the same fashion — examined and re-examined 334 REVIEWS. — written and rewritten — until condensed into tlie rcsidunvi of its marrow or substance, is often really no bad thing. Could our respected friend liave been prevailed on to adopt some such process in regard to his " True Church,'' even ret;unii.g his tlirce grand divisions of, 1st. " Preliminary Remarks ;" 2ndly. "The .lews' reiuin;" and 3rdly. " Tiie Cotirse oF the Church," we fancy that he niiglit have produced, if amuch smaller and shorter, at all events a decided- ly superior article. But the last and worst feature — the most grievous defect — of the worthy author's book, is the extreme superficiality of his notions concerning prophecy and its fulfilment. The elements of the subject, even, he has scarcely mastered. As to deep, comprehensive, and truly spiritual views, although some appear to have begun to enter into and take possession of his mind, they exist there, for the most part, in a state almost chaotic. They are. indeed, withovt Jorm and void. When he attempts to reduce them to order he flounders awfully ; and the re- sult but too ofieii is " confusion worse confounded." Pleasing, as well as interesting, however, is it to mention that his best thoughts by far on the sub- ject of prophecy, are those which appear to have entered into his mind directly from the scriptures. Would that he had stopped at these. Dissatisfied, how- ever, with them — and no reason had he to be thoroughly satisfied with what existed in his mind in a disorderly form, and in flat contradiction to mere human ideas on the subject which, nevertheless, he was desirous and detei- jnined to retain — he has quitted that divine authority, which, had he been less impatient might in due time have cleared up all difficulties, and betaken him- self to the instructions of ignorant and erring men. Unfortunatelv for himsell', he has fallen into the hands of nearly the worst class of these. (We say iiearii/ the word class, for it is matter of doubt with us, whether Miss ilobbs' friends and coadjutors, or these whom Mr. Biden has had recourse to, be the more jgnoraiU and incompetent in such matters). Men of learning and research like Elliott, and men of eloquence like Gumming, but as regards the true and scriptural meaning of prophecy, the veriest quacks in existence. Men in whom has been realised, although in a sense somewhat different from that in which lie wrote it, the jioet's adage: — A little learning is a dangerous thing. By such men, Mr. Biden has been captivated. Should we not rather say, fascinated? While occasionally difiVring from them, and doing so once or twice with an evident approximation to the truth, he in general unhesitatingly adopts their views, and is some times even found assenting, as if to an oracle, to the merest fancies and most puerile conceits that ever entered into the human brain.* The two witnesses (Kev. xi. 3 — 13), although so clearly the Old and New Testaments, the two portions of the divine word, through which God reveals and bears testimony to His own character, as that there seems to be no possibility of mistaking them, he yet, with Dr. Gumming, supposes to he the members of Christ's Chiu'ch. The. time, times, and half a time, he perseveres in interpreting by the specific chronological period of 1260 years, instead of per- ceiving that 12(i0 years constitute the symbol of three spiritual periods and a half. We are positively grieved and annoyed at all this. Dear Mr. Biden, the Lord conduct you to the knowledge of His own word, and thereby enable you to throw overboard at once the human idols whose worship has, to a jiainful extent, led you so decid. dly astray. Knlightened by (iod himself, you will discover, that it is not human historical facts, or supposed facts, humanly observed, humanly arranged, and humanly reasoned from, that constitute the basis of a divine interpretation of projdiecy. Had they been fit- ted to do so, then human talents and human education would have clothed men with something like the miraculous and infallible character of the * S>ef, for instance, the readiness willi which Mr. Biden feizes on and adojjts as his own, Dr. riiniriiinn's Mild, lanciful, and most alis-iinl iiitcrinctation oC the v.mip, " AV lite thini not." I'p. 380- 38(1. POETRY. 33/5 Apostles. Such a notion, however, is as inconsistent witli fact, as it is absurd and blasphemous. When divinely taught somewhat further than he now is Mr. Biden will discover that as the testinionij of Jesus is alone the spirit of prophecii, (Rev. xix. 10, Luke xxiv. 25-^27, 44, 45), so only in proportion as the glorified mind of Jesus is opened up to us, and made ours by faith in God's recorded te.t foity years, and who is acquainted with the labours and influence i(f one great and pious mind, the subject of this memoir, can doubt of his having been greatly instrumental in jjiodueing that change. We must fay, luAvever, tha$ NEIL DOUGLAS. 357 \*hilst Arniiniaii views are now very much taught in Scotland, Mr. D. was himself a decided believer in the doctinne oi the election of grace, and in the absolute communication of that grace to the soul by the spirit of God irrespec- tive of creature will. He was a believer in the trinity, — in the deity and atonement of Jesus. In church government he was an independent, and favourable to pastoral appointments over congregations. The ordinances were periodically dispensed in his church. He devoted one sabbath monthly to visiting his Greenock bretlu'en. For many years he thus laboured with great energy of body and mind in the work of the ministry, diffusing correct views of the Fatherly character of God ; and his ultimate design of mercy towards all men. We should state that he took a warm and special interest in maintain- ing the Deity of Jesus ; and when efforts were made to propagate Unitarianism in Scotland, no chrgyman presented so much and so powerful opposition to it as himself. On this subject he has written some most valuable works. Though as a clergyman he was quite aggressive on what he regarded as error in points of faith, he ever conducted his opposition in a most charitable and Christian manner. In private he was extremely affable, courteous and winning. The fear of God was with him an ever-abiding and operating feel ing, and gave a charm and a hallowedness to his conversation that can only be understood by those whose high privilege it was to enjoy it. And, oh ! how humble he was and how accommodating to all! The kitchen of the poor man he enjoyed as pleasantly as the parlours of the wealthy. Never was his con- versation other than extremely interesting and instructive. He was full of anecdote, wit, pleasantry, and an inexhaustible store of information. His memory was most retentive ; he has said to the writer, that though the Bible were lost he could nearly supply the whole of it, chapter and verse. There was a charm about his private manner surpassing nearly every ihjng of the kind we ever met, He made you feel instantly at ease in his presence ; and discoursed with such affectionate kindness to all around him on the great sub- jects that interested his mind, that one felt as if breathing the very atmosphere of heaven: so holy, so pure, so sweet, so instructive, so noble was his conversa- tion, without the slightest ministerial pedantry or assumption of personal consequence. The parents of the writer were extremely hostile to Universalism. His mother, a remarkably pious and excellent woman, often grieved herself most bitterly and painfully at her son's departure from the common faith. She habitually engaged in prayer that he might be brought back again from the errors into which he had fallen. Unknown to her, and when his father was on his death-bed, he introduced Mr. D. to the family. He spent two hours in precious conversation with both ; and what a change ! Bigotry and opposition were broken down. He won their respect, and even affection. When he left the house the mother slied tears, and often afterwards went and heard him preach — wishing that the gospel which he taught were true! We come now to speak of an extraordinary event in his life. His sermons were sometimes called political, because in lecturing very often from the pro- phets, he took occasion to contrast the state and government of ancient king- doms with the stale and governments of Europe, the British government included. He was an avowed and d-.-cided refirmer, and he took frequent 358 NEIL DOUGLAS. occasions to denounce the misgovernnient of our country. Such preaching and feeling commanded great attention, and, in times? of distress, great audi- ences. In the j'eais 1816 and 1817, very great distress existed in the west .if Scoiiand, among the working population. He sympathised intensely with the people, and denounced and exposed the causes of tlieir miseiy, part of whicli lie attributed to the government. The authorities regaided him as a disaffected seditious preachc^r. Crowds went to hear him, and at length steps were taken to prosecute him. Police were sent to his church to note his words, and he •was apprehended, examined, and committed for trial tm a charge of sedition, before the High (^ourt of Justiciary, Edinburgh. The whole country was thrown into great excitement by this act. Mr. D., now growing old and feeble, had to prepare himself for trial. He would then be about sixty-seven years of age. His examination before the SlierifFof Glasgow lasted three days. Everything was done to make him commit himself to the fangs of the law. Ho made his declaration with the honesty and frankness of a Christian ; and such was the advantage taken of that honesty that he regretted that he had not followed his Lord's exam])le by remaining silent, and leaving his accusers to substantiate their charges as they best could. 'I"he Crown brcught all its weight and con- centrated power against him, with the evident jnnjuose of crushing and im- pris:)ning this patriot and Christian: but behold! the Scottish bar, ever characteiised for philanthropy and a high sense of justice, was not unobservant of this matter, and individuals of no less eminence that J. P. Grant, Esq. M.P. the late Lord Jeffrey, Lord Cockhurn, and J. A. Murray, Esq., all advocates then flew to the rescue and defence of the venerable man of God, and offered to plead his cause gratuitously. All that was necessary to be done, they did. The evidence of town-criers and paltry-minded policemen — men who j)rovcd their inadequacy as witnesses in such soh'mn matters, — completely failed even in the hands of the Crown, and thus rendered any great exertions on the j)art of his counsel uimecessary. 'J'he Lord-Advocate, in addressing the jury, admit- ted that the evidence had broken down. The lesult was, that after a short speech from Francis Jeffrey, the jury instantly returned a verdict of not guilty _ At this verdict, the whole audience and the bar testified their approbation. This trial made some wondrous revelations of character to Mr. D. Some of his professed clerical friends proved traitors, and would not even testify to his character; and many individuals unknown to him showed him great kindness. By the merciless rigour of a landlord, to whom he owed nothing, he was forced to leave the house he occupied at the very time of his trial, and to sell his printing oflice for whatever it would bring. The legal persecutors, however, were signally foiled ; and God be praised that so it was. Hal Mr. D., in his great weakness, been sent to jail, he would, in all probability, have died in it. Mr. I), had prepared his defence, but did not need to deliver it. He however published an account of his trial with that defence, and a most interesting work it is. Mr. D , now acquitted in the face of t!ie ccnmlry, returned to his congrega- tion ill Glasgow, aijd continued to preach as usual, regardless of eillser danger or persecution. His bodily weakness, which had been gradually increasing, now rendered preaching painful and laborious; hut nothing could break his NEIL DOUGLAS. 359 Spirit. When unable to walk to his place of worship, he requi^sted his friends to carry him to it ; and this was done in a great many instances such was his anxiety to proclaim the truths taught hiin by God ; and such too was his weakness, that his friends often said he would die in the pulpit. On one occasion, tln-ough excessive weakness and over-exertion, he fainted in the pul- pit. His head fell on the book-board. He shortly afterwards so far recovered as to be able to express a wish that he might recover sufficient strength to say lo hisTiock, that he died believing in the doctrine he had so long taught them. He was, however, spared to them a short time longer. To save his voice whicli was now entirely broken, and which he could use only in whispers, some of the brethren engaged in the preliminary exercises of praise and prayer. Long before this time he had become very deaf, and it required great exertions of voice on the part of others to make him hear. Increasing weakness and disease put their veto at last on his public appearances; and oiten as he lay on a sick bed, did he mourn that he no longer could mingle witli his brethren in public worship, and in reading^ind preaching the Word of Life so dear to his soul. For some months during liis confinement to bed, he was, by reason of his great deafness, almost incapable of hearing the voices of his visiting friends, and thereby deprived of the intercourse which he so much loved. His voice too, had also become so weak, husky, and shattered, that it was diflicult to know what he said ; and in this state had he to wait for many months, till the days of his appointed time should be fulfilled. He retained, however, his con- sciousness to the last. During his long confinement, his mind was constantly exercised with divine things ; his lips expressing in broken accents the thoughts and feelings of his soul. During the earlier part of his illness, some of the members of his church occasionally went to see him, and engaged with him in private worship, Mr. D. himself taking part as long as he was able in this exercise. The writer never enjoyed this holy communion of Christian hearts? but often has he heard from the lips of those who did, how painfully sweet and how religiously solemn such meetings were. Towards the very end of his existence, only one or two of his Christian brethren were permitted to see him. Nature, after long suffering, at length yielded, and he died as he had lived, the adopted, the saved child of God, on January 9, 1823, in the seventy-third year of his age, and the fortieth of his ministry. Long before his death, he obtained the promise of his beloved deacon Mr. .Tohn_ Harvey, to see that his remains should be interred in his, Mr. H.'s burying ground, Calton. This was done. His remains were carried on the shoulders of Christian friends — menbers of his church — to the grave, attended by an exceedingly large number of persons whose minds were all pervaded by a strong solemn feeling, and whose demeanour was in impressive keeping with that feeling. Thousands gazed on this mournful spectacle with great and thoughtful interest, and a sentiment of universal respect towards tlie deceased was ail-pervading and freely expressed. The company assembled at the fune- ral was so large as to require a number of apartments to hold tliem. Members of his own church were asked to join in prayer in each apartment. The foir lowing inscription is on the tombstone of his grave:— 360 NEIL DOUGLAS. With permission of John Harvey, Proprietor of this lair. In Memory of NEIL DOUGLAS, A.M. Minister oi the Gospel, Who died on the ix. of January, mdcccxxiii. in the Seventy-third year of his Age, and the Fortieth of his Ministry. Also, of his Spouse, MARY M'MGRREN. Who died on the xxlil. of August, mdcccxxiv. in the Sixth-sixth year of her Age. We should have mentioned, that about the time he left Edinburgh, he pnarried a very religious woman, Mary M'Morren, by wliom he liad tio children. She survived him only about twenty montiis. She was a Methodist, and always kept connexion with the Wesleyaiis. It is believed that Mk D. in maintain- ing his own views had to bear up against much opposition of a very annoying kind constantly received from her; but he bore all this with singular patience and spirit, and yielded her, notwithstanding, the most kindly attention. This circumstance, however, prevented many of his friends from calling on him during his illness, and those who did, went on the faith of their character and religious relationship, determined not to be refused an audience with their loved, their dying pastor. Duiing the latter part of this illness, Mr. M'Dermid, Relief Minister, Pais- ley, to whom Mr. Douglas had done many valuable services, and who, not- withstanding, turned his back upon him, because of his doctrine, came to see iiim. But for what purpose? Serpent-like, to beguile him. What the precise nature of his conversation was we cannot tell ; only he very shortly afterwards proclaimed hi his pulpit that Mr. Douglas had recanted his belief in Univer- salism! The news spread throughout the country most nij)idly. Another Relief Minister, Mr. Jamieson, Bell's Hill, Lanarkshire, proclaimed the same in nis pulpit, on the authority of Mr. M'Dermid. It is quite astounding how much this circumstance became the theme of universal conversation — delight, ful to his foes and the foes of God's love, and most painful to his church and friends. They knew, nevertheless, that the report was false, and trumped up traitorously to extinguish the doctrine associated so much with Mr. D.'s name. It was his own brethren who had so often met and worshipped with him in private during his illness, and they all could bear testimony to the fact that so long as his tongue and voice could utter an audible syllable, he gloried in the doctrines whicli he had so long taught. When the slander was proclaimed, Mr. John Harvey, deacon of his church from its commencement, an old, a most uptight, and singularly pious man, ever beloved most dearly by Mr. D., went along with another member and saw Mr. D., to whom they managed to communicate a knowledge of the report, which Mr. D. instantly resented with all the feeble means he then possessed of expressing his feelings. His health recovered a little afterwards, and he expressed a hope he might again be able to appear in public to refute the calumny. Meanwhile, Mr. William Worrall, a student, and member of the church, and who often filled the vacant pulpit of Mr. D., published, with the approbation of the church, two letters addressed to the two Ministers named, in which he gave them a well-merited chastise- ment for their unfounded slander. To this no reply was made ; and, in point ol fact, the false report s^peedily died away. It was never again echoed in any XEIL DOUGLAS, 301 otlicr pulpit. The force of Mr. D.'s own character, morally, Intellectually, and religiously, was sufficient of itself to belie the slanderers, and extinguish their vile intention ; and it did so. Such an imputation on the f\ur f.mie of Mr. 1). for many, many years has never found the faintest echo in Great Britain ; though we learn that its expiring moan has lately been uttered in the United States to afl excellent friend of ours, Mr. John Morrison, New York, by a clergyman once in the Relief connexion in this country, of whom better things* might have been expected. We cannot conclude this narrative without expressing our own feelings for a moment hi reference to the great departed. Blessed were we in having the precious opportunity of hearing this servant of God preach in our own locality in the open air. It was at a time when Calvinism was seen and felt by us to be a most tremendous and appalling doctrine ; but the new view of it pro- pounded by Mr. D. gave it an entirely new and beautiful colouring. In pro- cess of time, we believed the gospel as taught by him, and rejoiced with glad- ness of heart. Some years afterwards, a church was formed in our locality, Johnstone, Renfrewshire, which he often visited ; and there are many who will never forget the religious importance of these visitations. When in this locality, the writer's bouse was his home ; and sweet and precious indeed were the hours be spent in private with our family. Mr. D. used to lament most bitterly the faithlessness of the Clergy. Many of them he knew to be believers in his views; but they would not proclaim them from fear of worldly ruin to them selves'; and some from a belief that it was not essential to proclaim the doc- trine to the world. One instance of this we may give. A cousin of ours, a- religious man, happened to call at our house when Mr. D. was present. This friend alluded to his having been a former member of Dr. Balfour's congrega- tion, Glasgow, and said that the Doctor habitually dwelt on the great love of God to the human family ; aiid that on this subject he was peculiarly interest- ing and grand. Mr. D. replied, that the Doctor himself was a believer in Universalism, and that hence it was he knew and felt how great was the love of God to man ; but that he did not think his duty lay in preaching the doc- trine of limited punishment to the people, fearing that such preaching might lead to evil. The Doctor himself admitted this to Mr. D., and hence it was that this celebrated preacher was well-known as one who never dwelt on future punishment, but had rather made himself remarkable for dwelling with sin- gular power and interest on the love of God in Christ Jesus. Some of our Glasgow friends are aware of another meeting which took place between Mr. D. and Dr. Balfour, when the same subject was spoken of; and when, though the worthy Dr. was not then so explicit, he bowed to the force of Mr. D.'s arguments, but expressed his fear as to the licentious tendency of preaching the restoration. Mr. Douglas knew that many clergymen sympatbisod with his views, and quietly wished him God speed. The writer of this can testify to the same fact; and in closing his narrative, he deeply regrets that from many causes, it is not satisfactory to himself, though truthfully lold ; nor indeed worthy at all of the great and remarkable Chiistian Minister, whose life is but too feebly and most CG2 NEII, DOUGLAS. imperfectly ])ourtrayed. We liere subjoin a list of some of his pul>lications, all iiort" out of the book market, and only found in the possession of private individuals. Titles of the Works of Neil Douglas. A.M. Sermons on important subjects, with some Essays in Poetry. By N. Douglas, minister of the gospel, at Cupar-Fife. Edinburgh: 1789. A few Essays in poetry, published for the benefit of a poor family. — Edinburgh : Strictures on the high price of provisions, the probable causes, and the most effec- tual remedies. In a series of letters. By a friend to the poor. Edinburgh: (without date, but apparently 1798.) Journal of a mission to part of the Highlands of Scotland, in summer and harvest, 1797, by appointment of the Relief Synod. In a series of letters to a friend. De- signed to shew the state of religion in that country. By N. Douglas, preacher of the gospel. Edinburgh. 1799. Lavinia : a poem. And an Asiatic petition. Followed by a memoir of the author's lately deceased Spouse ; with some short practical pieces. By a friend. (N. D ) Edinburgh; 1799._ An antidote against Deism : in a series of letters. "With an introductory letter to Mr. Vidler. By N. Douglas, minister of the gospel, at Greenock. — Edinburgh : 1802. Slander retorted : or Lucifer's thanks to those who plead for the endless duration of his character and dominion. To which some other articles are subjoined. — Greenock : printed by ami for N. Douglas. 1803. The threatened invasion improved, with a view to the final judgment. Printed and sold by the author, N. Douglas. — Greenock. 1804. Two Lectures delivered in Paisley, Dec. 11th. and 2oth. 180o, by N. Douglas, preacher of the everlasting gospel. To which is subjoined. Strictures upon an Essay on Eternal punishment, which appeared lately in the Missionary Magazine. — Glas- gow ; 1806. Messiah's proper Deity argued from Scripture : also, his atonement, and the di- vinity of the Holy Spirit : with a few strictures on the way of a sinner's acceptance with God, and on some Unitarian publications. By N. Douglas, preacher of the everlasting gospel, Glasgow. — Glasgow : 1807. A reply to Mr. R. Wright's letter, addressed to the author, animadverting on his essay in behalf of Messiah's proper Deity. By N. Douglas, preacher of the gospel, Glasgow. — Greenock : printed by Scott, Abercromby and Co. 1810. Messiah's titles, husband — redeemer, proofs of his proper Deity ; three Sermons, bv Neil Douglas, minister of the gospel, Glasgow. — Glasgow, 1811. " The Royal Penitent ; or true repentance, exemplified in David, king of Israel. A poem: in two parts IJy N. Douglas, minister of the word of God. — Greenock: printed by 'William Scott, 1811. Ttic outcasts comforted A sermon by Elhanan Winchester. With a short account prefixed, of what the author [editor] hath suffered for his principles. A new edition. Bv N. Douglas. Glasgow : date uncertain, supposed, 1814. King David's Psalms, in common use, with notes, critical and explanatory. By N. Dougla>, minister of the gospel. Glns.;ow: 1815. With portrait of the author. Strictures on the author's trial, declaration before the Sheriff, remarks on the crown evidence, and som? important information, respecting the cause of Reform. By N. Douglas, minister of the gospel. Glasgow, 1818. Tracts. The African's Lamentation. (Po-^m. Without date. Supposed to be 1794 or 1795.) Britain admonished: an extract from poems by W. Cowper, Esq., of the Inner Temple ; to which is subjoined, an elegiac poem, to the memory of a deceased friend. Edinburgh. 1799. Summary view of the evidence of Universal restoration. Glasgow: 1806. Seasonable warning to parties who are inclining to the Unitarian system, or have already embraced it. — Price 4d. A critical examination of 1 Cor. xv. 24—28, shewing that the Unitarian view of that passage hath no countenance from the text — Price 3d. The two preceding published at Glasgow, 1809, or 1810. Extracts from a late selection from the sacred books, with some remarks, &c. No date. rhe reconciliation and restoration of all things, by .lesus Christ. Extracts from sundries. Glasgow. 1814. Thoughts on time and eternity, (a poem,) and some oilier articles. — Ghisgow, no date. Supposed, 1817, or 1818. ' REVIEW. 36o Anonymous, but uniformly ascribed to Mr. Douglas. A peep at the true telegraph ; or brief thoughts on Daniel, chapter second. 'By a student of divinity. — Kdinburgh : 1797. A defence of Restoration ; or an answer to a letter which has appeared in the Liverpool Theological Repository, September, 1807, under the signature, M. By Philanthrojiicos Filalethes.-— 1807. Edited by Mr. Do glas : The Vehicle of Free Inquiry, or the monthly medium of impartial discussion : in- tended as an antidote against the prevailing errors of the present day ; with accounts of the progress of the gospel, by means of Missionary and Bible Societies, &c. Vol. i. Glasgow: 1813. The Glasgow Universalist's Miscellany. Vol. ii. Glasgow : 1814. Connected with Mr. Douglas : Two letters : the one addressed to Mr. M'Dermid, minister, Paisley ; and the other to Mr. Jamieson, minister at Bell's Hill, on the reported recantation of Mr. N. Douglas. [By William Worrall.] Glasgow : 1822. • Sermon delivered at the Universalist Church, Glasgow, January 19th, .823, in consequence of the demise of Neil Douglas, V. D. M. By William Worrall. Glasgow : 1823. NOTE. Mr. Fraser having been obliged to embark for the United States of America, without leaving his intended list of Mr. Douglas' publications, the task of drawing it up has devolved on Dr. Tiiom. That gentleman has endeavoured to make the catalogue as complete as possible, from the materials which were put into his hands. Dr. Thorn begs to suggest the two following alterations in the preceding narrrafive : — 1. Instead of Cupar-Angus, read Cupar-Fife. 2. Instead of " Sir H. Miller," &c., read " William Millar, Esq., of Starr." The name of Mrs. Douglas' half-brother was William, he having borne the same name as his father. See Mr. Douglas' dedication, prefixed to tlie " Glasgow Universalist's Miscellan\'," Vol. ii. 1814. Dr. Thoni also suggests, in order to render one of the preceding paragraphs thoroughly intelligible, that the "British Convention" which was broken upby Provost Elder, sat at Edinburgh, in December, 1793; and that the trials of Messrs. Muir, Fysche Palmer, Skirving, Margarot and Gerrald, for sedition, occurred at Edinburgh, in 1 ("93, and 1794. Mr. Mealmaker's took place some years afterwards. A list of the leading reformers of 1793, 4, ir chiding Mr. Doujilas, will be found in the parody on the well-known Scotcii song, " Fj', let us a' to the weddin','' generally ascribed to Dr. Drennan. REVIEW. The Christian doctrine oj future punis/unent.s ; By Andrew George Molle'r, A. B. To which are subjoined two Idlers addressed to the autlior, with ob- servations an the yipocaliijjse : By the late Dr. -JosEni Stopford, Ex. S.F. — T.C.D. ; and notes in the margin of a tract entitled, '■'■The Doctrine of Liniversal Restoration examined and refuted.^' By Daniel Isaac Published for the author by Howe and Norman, Examiner Oflice, Clarence Street, Cheltenham. May be had" of all booksellers. Price Is. 1848. Another specimen of that clear, pointed, and scholarlike mode of writing, wliich is so characteristic of Mr. Moller. He says in his preface, which was composed in 1848 : — " The following little work has been v.j-itten about twenty-two years, and_ though never printed, occasionally communicated in MS. copies. When I began the inquiry, I did not know that any thing worth reading had been written on the subject, since the days of the Apostles ; and as I could only be satisfied by testimonies from Holy Writ, 1 did not inquire for the opinions of others. Yet I afterwards incidentally read B 3 364 MR. WILLIAM UPJOHN, REV. DR. THOM. the tedious but interestins; work of Stonchouse, whose mind, held down in the chains •and darkness of the Apocalypse, had vainly endeavoured to vindicte the attributes and character of the Almighty." We have so recently drawn attention to the high qualifications and charac- ter of JMr. Moller, as exhibited especially in certain j)ul)lications of liis, that it is scarcely necessary for us to do much more tlian txj)ress onr conviction, in reference to the present pamphlet, that it fully sustains his previously well- earned literary reputation. Its exposure of the popular dogma of never- ending torments, is simple, searching, and scriptural. I:s notes learned and most valuable. And its vvliole torn; calm, candid, modeiate, and dignified. No competently educated individual can fail to rise from the perusal of it, vvitliout having experienced feelings of tlie most pleasing description. Respecting the alleged inconsistencies, falsehood, and mere human origin of tlie Apocalypse, we claim the right to differ from liie learned author, aiid his German coadiutors. 'I"he Book of Revelation appears to us to be both genuine and authentic. 'I'o our mind it approves itself as a portion of ilie inspired Canon of Sciiptnre. With such a man as Mr Moller, however, we can afford, although decidedly, yet most affectionately, as to a matter of this kind, to disagree. Kow refreshing the thorough honesty and truthfulness which pervade a pio- dnction like this ! D. T. MR WILLIAM UPJOHN. The following passage contained in a letter recently addressed to the wi'iter of this, by Mr. VVhitmarsh, of Melbury Abbas, DorM t, is so creditable, at once to our venerable correspondent, and to the deceased subjectcf it, that we cannot resist the inclination to transfer it to our columns : — "Nor. 30,1851. " I see in one of the Reviews in " The Universalist" for this month, that you have referred to that most valuable ser- ant of God, the late Mr. Wm. Upjohn. What is said of him there is strictly true. I hope it rv'ill not be considered out of place, if I make a few remarks respecting my connexion with that dear man of God, for about twenty years. In the thirtieth year of my age,* a separation took place between the Old Wesleyans and myself, for preaching the righteousness of Christ, or what they c.illeA Calvinist doctrine: and about the same time, Mr. Upjohn was rejected by the Dissenters ; so that he had no place to preach in. I then invited him to speak in my small chapel at Cam. After a time, Mr. Upjohn rented a house in bhafiesbury, and we all joined together, and fitted it up for a chapel. Our united efforts con- tinued, till j(ist before Mr. Upjohn saw Ilelly's lctters,t when some unpleasant cir- cumstances took place, which occasioned a final separation between us. Had not this occurred, we should have accompanied him to America. Several of our valued friends, who are now in heaven, laboured to heal the breach. But without effect. And this useful servant of God left England quite suddenly — we never having had an oi)portunity of seeing each other again. This I deeply regret. Mr. Upjohn died on the 26th of August, 1847, just one'month before I lost my beloved partner in life." Let U5 hope, that, like the kindred dispute between Paul and Barnabas, the iriisunderstaiuiing in qmsticm was rendered subservient to the making known of the glad tidings of God's universallove, on scripture principles, in two places, instead of (ts beinjr confined to one. ^ D. T. REV. DR. TIIOM, OF LIVERPOOL. The Rev. j\Ir. Drew, Editor of the " Gospel Ijauner," United States, Avho, duiiiig his recent visit to our shores, had an opportunity of meet- injf and conversing with Dr. Thorn, of Liverjiool, thus records his im- pressions : — It was onr pleasure, while in Liverpool, to pass a Sabbatli's service with Dr, Thorn — tlie pastor of the only Universalist Church in that city — the only one, * Atiout IROG t Somewliere aljout 182.5. UEV. DR. THOM. 365 We believe, in tlie United Kingdom. By this we do not mean that Univer- salism is not preached elsewhere in England, indeed, it is in many churches. Not a few even of the Church of England ministers themselves hold to this doctrine and advance it in their discourses. Many of the best men of that Church in all time, have been believers in the ultimate triumphs of divine grace in the salvation of the entire family of man. So of preachers of other denominations. But Universalism as a distinctive sentiment, is hardly known in England; it is not thought that it is necessary for it to take this distinctive form. Men and women, and even ministers all over the kingdom, may believe in, enjoy, and avow it, and yet lose no cast, or forfeit religious fellowship. 'J'his is one reason, no doubt, why there are few or no Dissenting Societies in iMigland which erect the standard of Universalism as the central principle of their religious system, and admit none in their commiuiions but such as hold to it as the first and leadinalist, and walk upon the king's highway without danger? THE SAFE SIDE. " Truly," said Doubting, "you Universalists seem to be very happ)'. Your doctrine is very pleasing; and, to tell the truth, 1 should like to believe in it, and be a happy Universalist. But I reckon, it's always best to be on the safe side. If you are right, I am safe enough ; but if you are wrong, our system makes yoiu* case desperate indeed. So I think I will keep my faith, and be safe " Once on a time, as tales usually begin, two men went a fishing. A. had a good substantial boat, that admitted no water, and B. was in a leaky old canoe which would hardly sust-iin its own weight. A. caught fish in abundance, and had before him the prospect of a rich repast ; but B. had no time for fishing. It took all lis time to bail his crazy boat, and keep it above water. ''Truly, said he, "neighbour A. you are very happy there. You have got a good boat, and are taking fish finelv. To tell the truth, I should like right well to be in your boat, but ] reckon it's best to be on the safe side. If my boat sinks I can get into yours, and I know you have caught enough for us both. So I wi'l stay where I am. If this boat coes down, yours will save me, but if yours sink your case will be desperate Your fish and boat arc gone, my boat will not hold you, and as fur fish I have none for myself.'' The last we saw of poor B. he was bailing the old boat, and enduring the p;ings of hunger, for the purpose of being safe. " Whoso roadctb let him tiiiderstand." L. D. W. /J (59 correspondencp:. To the Editor of" The Universalist." Df.ar Sir, — Your correspondent, " Un tout seul,"' in replying in your pre- sent Number, to my argument in favour of the aiiirmative of the question — whether or not any who shall have previously died and risen again shall die the second death, makes the following remark: — "Respecting the 'risen dead,' my esteemed brother J. N. B.'s argument goes on the principle of a very unhappy translation of Rev. xx. 15, as though it stated a positive certain doctiine of the dead being raised to be cast alive into the lake of fire, for he says — 'all of them, &c. «s if there were a number, not to say a multitude. Whereas neither the English noi Greek text will allow of this : the English version, bad as it is, confines itself to the grammatical unit, singular number — but the Greek makes it quite an uncertainty that even one was so found." Id rej)lv to this, I beg to observe, that though in declaring what would take place under such and such circumstances, should they occur, hypothesis is right and proper: not onl\' would tliere be no propriety in ?<,^ but there would be no opportunity for it, in the Apostle's narration in Rev. xx. 15, of what he saw in vision. Now he could not in vision, any more than in his waking moments, see hypothetical persons or acts ; nor was he speculating as to what would take place in this or that case, but simply observing what did take place. Supposing your correspondent to have been in Paris during the recent outbreak, and in writing an account of what he saw, to have expressed himself thus : — " If any one was found with arms in his hands, he was arrested immediately ;'' — of course he would have been understood as meaning, that some were so found, and tliat everij one so found, was so treated ; and not as merely speculating as to probable or even certain consequences of being so found, should it occur. So that I submit that your correspondent's critique upon the words " itn;,'' by no means affects mv argument, which I repeat — The risen dead were judged out of the books: all of them who were not found in the book of life, suffered the second death, by being cast into the lake of fire — therefore, some of the riseri dead suffeied the second deaih. I remain, dear Sir, Yours faithfully, Weston-super-Mare, 12th Dec. 1851. l' N. B. To the Editor of " The Universalist." SiK,~Will your readers accept the follow- ing as the beginning of truth. See Psalm . Ixxviii. 2. The parables or fables of our Lord teach us, 'that this world is as a stage on which the actions of men are for signs of the ways of God — ^they teaching us "what the kingdom of heaven is like." For Man was created to image God, as a son image the fathei. Hence Adam was the son of God, of whom came Eve, who is for figure, or sign, or image, a symbol of the Church, the mother of us all. From her sprang Abel; who teaches us that the life given to carnal man, tt'SJ, is but as a shadow or vapour that passeth away. Cain, we are expressly told, Gen. iv. 1, is for a sign or re^jresentation of the spirit of that law by which the carnal life of Man is taken away for he is nTil n^? li^'iC ; whicl • is to say, the man is for a sign or image of Jehovah, the giver of the law ; he being, as to the Spirit, the very Jehovah — the jealous God, or brother ; as in the parable of the prodigal son ; and as is figured by Jonah. After these it is written Adam begat a son in his own like - ness, and after his own image, (who is the image of the Father,) and called his name Seth — which was to signify, God hath ap - pointed another Son, (even Christ, a spi- ritual Son, whose blood should atone for the sin of Cain — for his blood speaketh better things than the blood of Abel,) and he shall be in the place of Abel. And Seth begat Enos, or Enoch, who walked in all things according to the perfect law of God. 'fhis marks the time when the Sons of men shall worship God in spirit and in truth. Gen. iv. 25: and v. 3. Behold, then, how " the world is a stage, and every man and woman a player," teaching us what the kingdom of heaven is like. For saith the Spirit which begat man. The children thou hast given me are for signs and wonders. I am, Sir, Your obedient servant, J "Wapsuake. 370 WILL YOU ANSWER? 1. As we are required to love our enemies, may we not safely infer tliat God loves His enemies? If God loves his enemies, will He punish them more than will be for their good ? VVould endless punishment be for the good of jiny being? 2. If God hates liis enemies, why should we love our enemies? Are we required to be better t!ian our God? If God loves those only who love Him, in what respect is lie better than the sinner? Luke vi. 32, 33. 3. As we are forbidden to be overcome of evil, can we safely suppose that God will ever be overcome of evil ? Would not the infliction of endltss pun- ishment prove that God had been overcome of evil ? 4. If man does wrong in returning evil for evil, would not God do wrong were He to return evil for evil ? Would not the infliction of endless punish- ment be proof positive that God was returning evil for evil ? 5. Will not an infinitely good God do the best He possibly can for the whole human family ? Would not the infliction of endless punishment be the very worst that God can do for any being in the universe ? 6. As we are commanded to overcome evil with good, may we not safely infer that God will do the same ? Would the infliction of never-ending pun- ishment be overcoming evi! with good ? 7. Is God " without variableness or even the shadow of turning?'' If God loves His enemies 7)ow, will he not always love them ? If God will always love his enemies, will he not always seek their good ? 8. Is it just for God to love His enemies, and be "kind to the unthankful and the evil," in the present life ? Would it be unjust for Him to exercise the same love and kindness toward them in the future state ? 9. Would it be merciful in God to inflict endless pnnlshment? That is, would it be merciful to the sufferer? Can that be just which is not merciful ? Can that be merciful which is not just? Do not cruelty and injustice go hand ill hand ? 10. Does divine justice demand the infliction of pain from which mercy re- coils? Does the mercy of God require anything which His justice refuses to grant ? 11. Does not mercy plead for the salvation of all mankind? If any other attribute of Deity pleads for a different result, why should the pleadings of mercy be set aside ? 12. If the demands of the justice of God are opposed to the requirements of His mercy, is he not divided against Himself? If the requirements of His mercy are opposed to the demands of His justice, how can His kingdom stand ? Mark iii. 24. A. C. T. ERRATA. Page 6, (Index) 14th line from bottom, for " Sir John Stonehouse,'' read " Sir George Stonehouse." Page 292, line 8th of Correspondence, instead of " in my friend's hearing," read "On my friend's having." Page 293, line 31st from top, for " ever-existing," read " once-existing." Page 342, line 12th from bottom, for " confidence." read " affection." Page 358, 13th line from top, for " Sherifi" of Glasgow," read "Sheriff of Lanark- shire." Additions to the list of Neil Douglas' works, page 363: " The Duty of Pastors, par- ticularly respecting the Lord's Supper: a Synod Sermon. To which is added Dialogues on the Duty of Frequent Communicating, &c. with Answers to Objections made to that Primitive Practice. 1797." Also, "Britain's Guilt, Danger, and Duty: several Sermons from Isaiah xxvi. 8. A Monitory Address to Britain, &c. 1795." Page 365, 10th line from top, for " cast," read " caste." Princeton Theological Semtnary-Speer 1 1012 01029 3746