tion; he is reconciled to God by his very existence; he is, such as he is, good and acceptable in the sight of God; or, if he is to be reconciled by the objective world, the world is the higher, and thus his apparent nobility, his distinction, vanishes.

It is thus scarcely necessary to draw the conclusion that Philo was a stranger to those pious wishes and expectations that swelled the bosom of every orthodox Jew. His Messianic idea is a dead letter, retaining, as he does, only the expectation that all the Jews, scattered over the whole world, will be led back to Palestine by a supernatural phenomenon in heaven, (oç,) which will be visible to the pious alone; which, indeed, is strangely at variance with the world-citizenship which he claims for his nation, as well as with his being so well pleased with the whole world. This last remnant of the Messianic idea, which he had received by tradition, was foreign to his system, and, in itself, without meaning; but, foreign as it is to Philo, it still gives us an idea of the energy of the Messianic hopes of the Alexandrian Jews of his times, to whom he renders this tribute. We have now, in conclusion, only to investigate yet why the Messianic idea and that of the incarnation find no place in his system. The answer is: an atonement is, in his views, needless, on account of his views on sin and divine justice-the incarnation an impossibility. He seems, indeed, to claim liberty for man, but adds, immediately, that God exempts nothing from his power, with which, in Philo's views, individual liberty is scarcely compatible. The category of holy love is foreign to him. Yet what he says on the creation of man is especially instructive. The higher nature of man, his rational type, had to be imprinted by the Divine λóyos, not by that God who is before the λóyos, and better than all logical nature; therefore God speaks of himself as if speaking of another, (Gen. i, 27,) "I have made man after the image of God." But why does God speak of himself in the plural, (Gen. i, 26; iii, 22; xi, 7,) "Let us make man," etc.? Philo replies that this has reference to the powers surrounding God, since it did not become God (rò "Ov) to come into immediate contact with the world. These powers, ideau, angels, had to form the mortal part of our being, imitating the art of him that had formed the royal part in us. The princely part was formed by the Prince of all things, the lower one by inferior powers. But man was to be capable of choosing between good and evil, while other beings have either neither virtue nor vice, like nature, or only virtues, like the heavenly bodies; and thus God had to transfer the origin of evil (yévɛoɩç kakwv) to inferior beings, reserving to himself the origin of good. For the mixed is partly becoming for God, since the idea of the better is mixed with it:

partly not becoming for him, on account of the opposite, since the Father cannot be the cause of evil for his children. According to this, evil has its origin in creation, in which inferior beings took part. In other passages he reduces the origin of evil to matter. Personal guilt seems thus to be out of the question, since Philo speaks of evil in such a manner as if the will of man had nothing to do with it. If evil is only physical, there is, then, none at all. Agreeably to this he makes but little account of evil. He claims for every soul the Divine power of virtue, (Quod Omnis Probus Liber, § 16), while he says, in another place, "Not to sin at all is only God's, perhaps also a Divine man's, prerogative." This fluctuating looseness culminates in his theology in the relation in which Divine justice stands to his mercy. "God," says he, "is not unmerciful, but benevolent by nature. Who believes that, repents easily, hoping that God will forget." (De Profugis, § 18.) Those passages of Scripture that speak of anger and justice in God, he endeavors to interpret by comparing the lawgiver to a physician, who accommodates himself to the patient, not always to truth. That the ignorant may fear, and for the purpose of helping thoroughly, the lawgiver represents God as being angry. Of that earnest struggle, through which the noblest of the Old Testament people pass, in order to satisfy Divine justice and to secure God's favor, Philo knows absolutely nothing. He divests the religious process of that which gives it force, namely, of Divine justice, converting it into a mere figure of speech, whereby the whole is relaxed, the longing for something better extinguished, and the ethical consciousness endemonistically poisoned. For a Divine goodness that is not just must be physical, and can have for its highest and only enjoyment nothing but a state of well-being, even if this should be the feast of knowledge. (De Opif. Mundi, at large.) He can, indeed, not deny the evil consequences of sin; but as far as he refers them to God they have for their exclusive object the welfare of man. In this sense must be understood the kоλασTikỳ dúvapus-the punishing power, which he ascribes to the "Ov. Of the same kind is also his doctrine of providence and God's care of us, altogether physical, and neither moral nor religious. That a father should take care of his child is necessary, by the laws of nature, (φύσεως νόμοις καὶ θεσμοῖς ἀναγκαῖον.)

By this contempt of Divine justice, Philo has become the predecessor of the Gnostics; by his doctrine concerning Divine goodness he seems to approach the New Testament, and to go beyond the Old, but falls, in fact, below it, and makes the Christian redemption needless. When speaking of the return of his people, he seems, indeed, to have the old Hebrew doctrine concerning a previous atonement

forced upon him; but, according to Philo, the Jews will not be in want of intercessors with the Father, as they will have three mediators of atonement, (яapákλŋtoι twv Kataλλayiov,) namely: 1. The mercy and goodness of God himself, who always prefers mercy to punishment. 2. The sanctity of the ancestors of the nation; for the disembodied souls, that bring pure and undefiled offerings to their Lord, intercede successfully for their sons and descendants. 3. The last paraclete is the reformation of those that are led to the covenant.

We have seen above that, according to Philo, the world is always reconciled to God, is constantly engaged in the act of reconciliation, standing in its λóyoç as a blameless unity before God. All further development must accordingly appear to him as superfluous, as disturbing the harmony and peace of the world, which he views not in an ethical, but Hellenistic light. The law given by Moses is identical with the law of the world. The world is rational; the law, which is inherent in the world, has been brought to the consciousness of man by Moses, therefore it is eternal and not far from us; it is perfect and whole, admitting of no improvement.

As Philo teaches that man was created after the image of God, that he partakes of the nature of the λóyos, the inference appears plausible, that he postulates the most intimate relation between God and man, and that the idea of the incarnation cannot be foreign to him. He speaks of heroes, born out of immortal and mortal seed, in whom the mortal admixture was governed by the divine seed, and says, that this end is attainable still. But notwithstanding all this, he denies a real union between the Divine and the human. Where the Divine light shines, the human goes out, (Quis Rerum Div., § 53,) and where the Divine goes out, the human rises, (Oéшuç yàp οὐκ ἐστι θνητὸν ἀθανάτῳ συνοικῆσαι — for it is against the Divine will, that the human shall dwell together with the Divine.) For this reason, a state of ecstasy is absolutely necessary for receiving prophetic inspiration. The reason of this is not Philo's distinction between an unknown and actual God, since God says to Moses : "For me, it would be easy to grant what thou desirest, but not for thee to receive it;" but both his physical idea of God, and the admixture of the λn to all mortals, is the cause "why God is not communicable according to the infinity of his grace, but according to the capacity of the creature to receive. His power is infinite; all Divine powers are without limit; the creature is too weak to receive them, wherefore God gave not everything to us, but only as much as our nature can bear." Man must lay down his body, in order to arrive at a higher state of existence. His distinction between God

as the active principle, (dpaσrýolov,) and the world as the passive principle, (adηTIKóv,) would be done away with by the incarnation. While Christianity sees in the human body not only an organ of the spirit, but also a requisite for the self-actualization of the same, Philo knows neither to look upon suffering as a deed also, nor sees he in the body anything else than a limit, a barrier. If he would need a Christ at all, he would have a docetic one, (Aóyoç aldıoç,) an everlasting logos; but he does not even desire a new theophany of the logos. Even a metaphysical union of the cosmical opposites, God and world, he has so little succeeded in effecting, that man, in whose personality they center, the λóyos and the ❝λŋ, does not really represent this union, in two directions. For God remains foreign to humanity; Philo's idea of the Deity is far from seeing the cause of man's existence in God; and man remains so foreign to the other extreme, the vλn, that he realizes his idea fully by laying it aside, by becoming disembodied, as Philo conceives of his original man, and those that are perfect. Thus the two extremes, God and λŋ, lie beyond man, limiting absolutely his knowledge and his liberty, and thus standing opposed to him as absolute mysteries, and as an unconquerable power of gravity. But these two extremes are also irreconciled to each other, and as their dualism produces the greatest unhappiness with consciousness of man, so he places also above God himself, who can never conquer matter fully, however desirous he may be of effecting it, a dark fate; divests his idea of God of all mere atheistical absoluteness, and thus makes it really pagan. Philo, inebriated with the Grecian idea of wisdom and beauty, knows how to cover up these contradictions, and to impart to the scientific, ethical, and religious comfortlessness of his stand-point the appearance of cheerfulness and beauty. But while the Grecian beauty is natural, his harmony is artificial and powerless. This harmony, however, shallow as it is, he looks upon as something higher, namely, as that union of the pagan and of the Jewish religion, which could be effected only through Christ; and we must confess that in his system the human mind has made the attempt to effect a union of the antechristian religions. Newly-born Christianity had thus, as it were, a rival in this attempt. But however dazzling for a superficial observer the similitude of many of his phrases and ideas with Christianity may be, their principles are diametrically opposed to each other, and even those expressions that are apparently identical have in their connections widely different meanings. So every reader of the Bible knows, that the λóyos of St. John, and all the epithets given to him, the terms world, man, and even God, mean things different from what we have found Philo to designate by the

same terms. Like Christianity, Philo would represent the world as celebrating an everlasting reconciliation by the 2óyos; but what could be effected only by the fact of an humble condescension on the part of the 26yoç, and what a pious desire was justified in waiting for as a Divine fact, that Philo fancies as accomplished forever, as accomplishing continually, and thus he becomes antagonistical to Christianity. His system approaches thus as a specter-like antagonism the cradle of Christianity, and appears on that horizon on which was to rise Christianity in order to set no more, as a dazzling, dissolving fata morgana. That the logology of St. John and Christianity has nothing to do with Philo's, we may, after what has been developed in the preceding pages, affirm without fear of successful contradiction; whether his logology and the incarnation, in particular, have anything in common with either Judaism or paganism, as it existed in the time of Christ, may be made the subject of investigation in one or two future articles.

ART. VIII.-RELIGIOUS INTELLIGENCE.

GREAT BRITAIN.

The Protestant Churches.-The missionary labors of the English Churches on the most extensive and promising missionary field of Christianity have been sadly interrupted by the Indian insurrection. But it is confidently hoped that much good will result from the momentary distress. The general observance of the day appointed for humiliation and prayer, has been an edifying example for all Europe. Many statesmen who before were opposed to the Indian government lending any moral influence to the efforts of the missionary, have changed their mind, and it is expected that, while no violence of any kind will be used to bring about the conversion of Hindoos and Mahommedans, yet the Christianization of India will meet with a more energetical support on the part of the government. The missionary societies are fully alive to the importance of the crisis, and prepare themselves for a vigorous revival and extension of their Indian missions. The Wesleyan connection, in particular, has given a laudable example to the other denominations, by making great efforts to

increase the number of its missionaries in India. In this commonness of affliction and hope the Evangelical portion of the Established Church has given another proof of its catholic spirit, by freely associating with Dissenters in common prayer. But the Puseyites have called this step a palpable violation of the spirit and the letter of the Prayer Book and Canons, and a wanton scandal and offense of the Church. The necessary development of Romanizing tendencies in the Tractarian party has led to a split, one fraction, whose organ is the Union, carrying its sympathy with Rome so far as to create the suspicion, even among the other fraction of the same party, that their union with Rome is already an accomplished fact, and that they remain in the State Church only to lead over to Rome greater masses. It is gratifying to see that, while the Protestant character of the Establishment is still jeopardized, the dissenting denominations carry prosperously onward the mission of Protestantism. The storms which threatened the Congregational Union have subsided, and its last autumnal meeting has again been a peaceable The fame of Spurgeon, the great

one.