of a word from its connection, and so, in effect, become a dictionary unto himself. No man ever became a proficient in any language without this independent method of investigation. The author must be made to explain himself. The great William Pitt, who was a first-rate classical scholar, was accustomed to read Thucydides rapidly, translating mentally as far as he was able; and when he came to a word which he could not make out, leave it untranslated, until, from the connection, the meaning became clear. Thus every man who would obtain an independent knowledge, so as to feel he has the mastery of a language, must practice the method of seeking the interpretation of a word as much as possible from the author himself. This, of course, contemplates the constant use of a lexicon up to a certain stage; that is, until a considerable vocabulary is mastered; and a recurrence to it in all subsequent time, when the meaning of an author cannot be discovered from the context, or a comparison of the usage in another place.

It would not seem proper to close this article without giving some account of the Stephens' family of printers, or at least of Robert and Henry, father and son, who were the most distinguished of them all. For this family did more for the advancement of learning than any other in any age. The family of Estienne, or, as it is anglicised, Stephens, is found at Paris first about the year 1500. Henry, the grandfather of the Greek lexicographer, was a successful printer and bookseller. He published extensively, but his books were not, except very few, in the direction of classical studies. Robert S., his son, takes the office in 1526. He adopted, as was the custom of the times with all private establishments and guilds, a motto for his office, which was an olive tree, with a scroll winding among the branches, and on this was inscribed: Noli altum sapere (Rom. xi: 20). Some of the branches of this tree are lopped off, and the whole motto referred to the figure employed by the apostle to show how the Jews were rejected from the stock of the true Israel, and the Gentiles grafted into their place. Looking at this tree was the figure of a venerable man, by which the apostle to the Gentiles was undoubtedly meant. Robert S. favored the Protestant Reformation, and was suspected and persecuted by the Catholics because of the character of his publications. For many of these were editions of the Old

Testament in Hebrew, and the New in Greek. These persecutions and annoyances to which he was perpetually subjected led him, notwithstanding the favor and protection of Francis I. King of France, to remove to Geneva, where he openly professed Protestantism. Before he removed, however, he published a Latin Thesaurus, which, like the greater work of his son for the Greek, has, with its various additions, been recognized as the only authoritative one of that language. Before his day the Latin Dictionary in common use was that of Calepio. This was a moderately extensive, but ill-arranged, work, containing materials of great value, but needing a master to reduce them to proper order. Such a person was found in Robert S., who undertook to print a new edition. But when he entered upon this work he found so many changes and corrections necessary, that he recast the whole. So radical were the changes, and so numerous the improvements, that it was in truth a new book; and while he made full acknowledgments for all the aid furnished him, he also felt justified in suppressing Calepio's name, and calling it "Roberti Stephani Thesaurus Lingua Latina."* Of this he issued three editions, the last in 1543. In 1549, Gesner published an edition, with corrections, though substantially the same work, under his own name, suppressing Stephens,' and without acknowledgment. Subsequently, in the edition of 1749, the name of Robert Stephens was restored to the title-page. This Thesaurus remained the standard, without change, till 1771, when Forcellini published a revised edition under the name, Tatius Latinitatis Lexicon. This work has been further edited by Facciolatti, and is known by his name; though it has received further corrections and enlargements from Furlanetti, Corradini, and De Vit. This work is, however, essentially the Thesaurus Ling. Lat. Roberti Stephani; so that these two, Robert and Henry S., are the real authors of the only Thesauri for the Latin and Greek languages, recognized as the final authority.

Before leaving Paris Robert S. printed an edition of the Greek Testament in folio, which is the most elegant ever issued ; and is the basis of the English translation; t for the Textus Receptus of Elzevir differs in no material point from it.

*Almeloveen Vit. H. S.

+ Quar. Rev., 234.

In going from Paris to Lyons, on horseback, in 1551, which proved to be his last journey from the former place, he divided the New Testament into verses, the same which are now used. An immense number of Greek classics, issued by him and by Henry were deemed so accurate and valuable, that they formed the basis of citation for grammars and lexicons, which referred to them by the page, and divisions of the page indicated by the letters A-E. This system of citation is still adhered to in some authors-e. g., Plato. Robt. S. died at Geneva in 1559, leaving his business and the most of his fortune to Henry-born 1532, the second of this name and the greatest of the family-under the conditions that the press should remain at Geneva, and the son not relapse into Catholicism. Part of the family and the larger portion of the business, however, remained at Paris, and this caused Henry to vibrate between this place and Geneva, and to form the habit of wandering, which grew on him continually. Both father and son took great pride in the splendor of their editions. The former printed many school-books also, and such editions as were cheap and in usual demand, so that he grew rich by his business. The latter confined himself chiefly to magnificent editions of Greek authors, of which his Plato is the most conspicuous, and these, together with the great expense of his Thesaurus, injured him financially. But the greatest blow his fortune received was by the surreptitious abridgment of the Thesaurus by Scapula, who was employed by Stephens. The latter did the work and the former, as is often the case, reaped the reward of his labors. Henry S. never recovered from this injury. He tried to mend his fortunes by seeking pensions from kings and nobles as the reward of fulsome dedications of his books. He thus, in waiting on royalty, neglected his business; and with the ordinary fate of literary men who seek the patronage of the great, became wearied with waiting, and got nothing but fair promises. Repeated disappointments soured his temper; and this, added to great egotism, made him well nigh insufferable to his most intimate friends, as may be seen in the biography of Cassanbon, his son-in-law. He wandered about continually, finally lost his reason, and died in 1598, at a hospital in Lyons, far from home, away from friends, and without money! Even his funeral was desecrated by a Catholic mob, hounded on by

priests and monks. There is nothing more sad in literary history than the fate of Henry Stephens. The work which he did. in a single year as editor, printer, proof-reader, publisher, was enough to fill an ordinary life, to give an author enduring fame, and secure him wealth. Yet he worked constantly at this rate from 1545 to 1580, was driven mad by pecuniary disappointment, and died in a hospital!

ART. V.-CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS.*

BY HENRY B. SMITH.

THE Italian philosopher, Giovanni Battista Vico, the founder of the modern philosophy of history, and one of the ablest and most comprehensive of the philosophers of the eighteenth century, develops, in his Principles of the New Science, a theory of civilization embracing what he calls the Law of Returns. Each age runs its appointed course and dies; and after a long period there will be a return of the same process. Though this cannot be called a final law of history (since it neglects too much the law of progress), yet it shows us one of its marked conditions. At different periods, widely sundered, we find

* Apologetik. Wissenschaftliche Rechtfertigung des Christenthums. Von J. H. A. Ebrard, Dr. Phil. et Theol. 2 Theile. Gütersloh, 1874-5.

System der christlichen Apologetik. Von Franz Delitzsch. Leipz., 1869. Christliche Apologetik auf anthropologischer Grundlage. Von Christ. Ed. Baum.

stark. Erster Band [all published], Frankft a. M., 1872.

K. H. Sack, Christliche Apologetik. Hamburg, 1829. [Second edition, 1841.] Von Drey, Apologetik als wissenschaftliche Nachweisung des Christenthums in seiner Erscheinung. Mainz, 3 Bde. 1844-1847. (Roman Catholic.)

Werner Geschichte der apologetischen und polemischen Literatur, 5 Bde. 1861-67. (Roman Catholic.)

Dr. Fr. Düsterdieck, Der Begriff und die encyclopädische Stellung der Apologetik two instructive articles in the Jahrbücher f. deutsche Theologie, 1866. Dr. Düsterdieck is a Consistorial Counsellor in Hannover.

Theod. Christlieb, Modern Doubt and Christian Belief. Transl. by Rev. H. U. Weitbrecht, etc. New York, 1874.

Luthardt, Apologetic Lectures. Three series: On the Fundamental, the Saving and the Moral Truths. Transl. Edinb.

similar historic laws, though working under different conditions. The early literature of Christianity was apologetic. The same is true of the present literature of Christianity in almost all its departments. We, like the early church, live in an apologetic era. There is hardly an effective theological work, we might almost say, hardly any great Christian discourse, which does not take on an apologetic stamp.

I.

Apology, Christian Apologetics (not yet to define it more precisely), is essentially Vindication. It seeks to vindicate, and in vindicating to establish, the value and authority of the Christian faith. It begins, in fact, with the Scriptures, the epistles, and especially the discourses, of Paul. In Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, and other Christian writers, it received more distinct form, proposing to defend Christianity against all gainsayers. All that belongs to the proof of the Christian religion, and all that belongs to its defense, and all that belongs to its counter-attack against its foes, is a part of Apologetics. For Apologetics is not only apology, but onset. It cannot be content with repelling assault, it must assail in return, and dislodge its foes from their camp. It is war in its ultimatum—the breaking down of the strongholds of its foes. It cannot be content with anything else or less. And this must be so, from the nature of the case. The Christian faith, if anything, is everything. And hence, the ultimate object of Apologetics must be to show that Christianity is the absolute religion; that there is salvation in no other.

We sometimes think it strange-it almost alarms us-that Christianity should be so desperately assailed; but when we come to think about it, it is the most natural thing in the world. Evil will always attack good; error instinctively assails the truth; sin, by its very nature, is opposite and opposed to holiness. Incarnate Love was crucified between two thieves; and the church cannot expect to be better treated than its Head and Lord-it is surely enough for the servant that he be as his Master. Men who cannot find God in nature, cannot find God in the Bible. Men who deny the supernatural, must consider all religious faith a delusion. The secularist who looks at everything sub specie mundi, cannot see anything sub specie æterni.