And still it shines a precious gem,
To beautify Jerusalem,

And makes its very ruins dear,
That here our Jesus dropp'd a tear.
That tear of pity was not shed

O'er friends who loved his sacred head,
But enemies whose hate and scorn
Would crown it yet with piercing thorn.
Before him rose the dreaded hour
Whose awful horror had the power
To wring the cry of agony,-

66

My God, hast thou forsaken me!"
He heard the wild infuriate cry
Of" Crucify him!"-" crucify !"
And then before his vision came
The buffeting, the spitting-shame!
The barbed shaft of bitter scorn,
The mocking of the coming morn,
When, clothed in robes of kingly pride,
They mock'd and scoff'd him ere he died.
Nor hidden then the' accursed tree-
The wounds and groans of Calvary -
The darkness shrouding up the sky-
It all was open to his eye;

Yet could not check the tear that rose
And fell o'er Salem's guilt and woes.

A. A. P.

MR.

THE DOCTRINE OF ATHANASIUS.

R. CONSTAPLE has somewhat over-estimated my intention in the citation of the remarkable passage from Athanasius, on the "Incarnation of the Word." I am sufficiently acquainted both with the quotations now given by Mr. Constable, and with others which he has not given, to prevent me from thinking that Athanasius can be reckoned as a fellow-believer with us along the whole line of our argument. But the foundation of my own treatise lies in the doctrine of man's originally perishable nature, and in his loss of the prospect of eternal existence as well as of eternal blessedness, by his fall; and on this matter Athanasius is thoroughly sound, and expresses his judgment in a uniform manner. He knows nothing of Augustine's essentially indestructible soul, but declares that man sank under the curse of not being by sin, and has been redeemed from it by Christ. I am afraid it is true, as Mr. Constable points out, that he sometimes says that the renewed immortality will be forced upon the wicked-but that is only an inference of his own. Athanasius is quoted by me only to show that he knew the incarnation to be the means of human immortality,—and that the sin of Adam had brought the curse of absolute destruction upon humanity. And I have nowhere attributed more than this to Athanasius. This,

however, is a very important concession, because it fixes the original and proper meaning of all the most important Hebrew and Greek words concerned in this controversy, and enables us to answer Athanasius himself when on other occasions he falls into the use of them in perverted

senses.

If Mr. Constable asks why I have used this partial testimony of Athanasius, I must refer for a good precedent to his own correct treatment of Justin Martyr, and Mr. Denniston's treatment of Irenæus. The fact is, that the Fathers are full of self-contradictory statements, they were troubled with confusion of mind, arising from the confluence of ancient ecclesiastical doctrine (which compelled them to speak some of the language of truth respecting man's nature, fall, and redemption) with a stream of popular and "philosophical" language based on a wholly different system of metaphysics. So that sometimes you get from them a clear and good statement of the doctrine of life in Christ only, and sometimes a statement which is quotable as "authority" by our opponents. If any one will read carefully the second section of my twentysixth chapter, he will, I think, find a true account of these complicated intellectual circumstances of the earlier Fathers.

In reply, therefore, to Mr. Constable, I have to say that I have used the testimony of Athanasius exactly on the same principle that I have used the testimony of Dr. Watts in my preface; not for the purpose of showing that he never taught the doctrine of endless misery, but for the purpose of showing that he holds a doctrine on the original nature of man, on his fall, and on the scope of redemption, which precisely conforms to our own position, and furnishes the strongest ground for resisting the general argument of Augustine, and the occasional contrary statements both of Dr. Watts and St. Athanasius.

A new digest of authorities is required in these columns, containing, first, the names of those who agree with us wholly; secondly, the names of those who differ from us wholly; and thirdly, the names of those who agree with our premisses on the question of the fall and the incarnation, but differ from our conclusion as to the restriction of the newly given immortality to the righteous. The names in the last column are quotable on both sides-but the face of the argument on our side gains immensely more than that on the side of the othodox; since the precedent supplied, for example, by Athanasius is fatal to his own inferences when he agrees with Augustine.

I often think we read these ancient writers under much disadvantage through our frequent inability to fix the chronological succession of their compositions. If we could certainly fix the dates of all the writings of Athanasius for example, we might find his earlier pieces to contain the passages now quoted by the Augustinian poets; and this great treatise on the Incarnation of the Word to contain his latest and most complete view of redemption. There are few of us whose views are wholly unchanged during thirty years; and I do not know any modern writer who has set us a better example of manly frankness in confessing to alterations of judgment than Mr. Constable himself. Surely a similar process must have operated in many of the minds of the writers of the first four centuries, though they had not the grace to acknowledge it. Brathay House, Tufnell Park, N. EDWARD WHITE.

IF

227

INFIDELITY AND CHRISTIANITY.

a Deist be right in contending that there has been no Revelation, and that men need no Revelation, but that reason is sufficient as a guide and instructor, he cannot object to our trying his theory by the test of experience, and appeal to undeniable facts. We draw, then, a contrast between what was effected towards the amelioration of human condition whilst heathenism had the world to itself, and what has been done since Christianity gained partial sway. We will take the most favourable exhibition which ancient records furnish, where an empire extended itself over half the globe, where arts flourished in their fullest efflorescence, where poetry was in all its harmony, and philosophy in all its vigour. And would any man desire to be transported back nineteen centuries, that he might be the citizen of a country which had thus reached the summit of renown, whose monuments are still our studies, and from whose ruins we yet gather the models of our sculpture and our architecture? We are sure that, whatever differences of opinion there may be as to the cause, there must be universal agreement as to the fact, that in all which gives real dignity to a state, in the defining and defending genuine liberty, in all which tends to promote and uphold public prosperity, and to secure peace and happiness to the families of a land, there is no comparison between the advances made whilst reason was man's only instructor, and those which may be traced since reason had the aids of a professed Revelation. We are not afraid to refer it to the decision of the most inveterate opponent of Christianity, whether civilisation has not advanced with a most rapid march wheresoever the Gospel has gained footing: and whether the institutions of a country professedly Christian could be exchanged for those of the most renowned in heathen times, without the loss of what we hold dearest in our charter, and the surrender of what sheds their best beauty round our homes? We have never heard of so thorough and consistent an advocate of the sufficiencies of reason, that he would contend for the superior civilisation, the finer jurisprudence, the greater civil liberty, the purer domestic happiness attained to whilst reason was not interfered with by communications which avouch themselves from God. We are bold to affirm that he who is most strenuous in opposing Christianity, and most vehement in decrying it, thinks it fortunate for himself that he has been born in Christian times and a Christian land. He may refuse to give us a testimony; but, whether he will or no, it is furnished by his own admissions. We only ask whether he prefers what reason achieved by herself, to what has been achieved since the coming of Christ; and knowing what his answer must be, we know also that he is a witness to the worth of Christianity. We know what his answer must be. We know that he would be ashamed to wish the restoration of the worship of a thousand impure and fabled deities. We know that he could not decide that there was as much protection for property, as staunch a guardianship of the helpless, as equable a distribution of justice, as active a benevolence towards the suffering and the destitute, as general a diffusion of respectability and happiness, whilst the world was left to its own strength and wisdom, as now that a religion has been introduced which professes to rest on immediate Revelation.

And this is enough to warrant our claiming him as a witness to the superiority of Christianity. He may imagine other reasons by which to explain the advancement which he cannot deny. He may pretend to assign causes which account for the improvement, and which are wholly independent of Christianity. But we contend that in the possession of Christianity alone lies the difference between ourselves and the nations whom we have vastly outstripped. We do not excel them in the fire of genius, and the vigour of intellect; for even now they are our teachers in the melody of verse, and in the strictness of reasoning, and in the mightiness of oratory; and we sit at their feet when we would learn to be mentally great. We dare not affirm that reason, by herself, could ever achieve more than she achieved in Greece or in Rome-for we are still but the pupils of the dead sages of these ancient states; we light our torch at their inextinguishable lamps, and, if ever we rival their literature, we presume not to think that we ever surpass. And therefore does

the assertion seem every way correct, that we should never have stood higher than they in all those respects in which, confessedly, they are immeasurably distanced, had we not been blessed with the revelation of the Gospel. The world had gone as far as it was possible for it to go with no guide but reason, and then Christ appeared to show how inconsiderable the progress had been.

We challenge then the rejector of Revelation. We summon him as a witness on the side of that which he openly denies. We have his confession-he cannot keep back his confession-that, wheresoever Christianity has prevailed, there has been a rapid advance in all that gives fixedness to government, sacredness to every domestic relationship, and therefore happiness to households. And this is virtually a confession, however he may seek out some subterfuge, that natural religion is vastly inferior to revealed as an engine for heightening the morals, and improving the condition of human-kind; that the guidance of reason alone is in no degree comparable to that of Revelation, when the ends. proposed are those which are eagerly sought by every foe of evil, and every friend of man-and oh, then, is it not a confession which warrants us in affirming, when opposing such as reject the Gospel of Christ, that "their rock is not as our rock, even our enemies themselves being judges."-Henry Melvill's Sermons.

THE

THE GOSPEL IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD.

HE old breach between man and man has been abridged. The peace of this world was broken on the day of Abel's death, and men have been at war ever since. Ishmaelites abound in the communities in which men are gathered-their hands against every man, and every man's hand against them. Governments have been planned to bring men together, and hook them together by the external restraint of laws and force. Philosophy has dreamed of communities in which men should make an interstock of their possessions, and unite as in a family where each should feel for the other, and control his own selfish interests.

Society and the castes which divide society, the ranks and orders among men, have contributed their influence in different ways to the solution of this problem-how to keep men from fighting one another; how to make bitter, vindictive, contradictory spirits be at peace; and they have all failed. Men are just as much opposed to one another as if there had been no government, although the manifestations of hatred and malice and bitterness may be suppressed, because the civil law takes hold of the acts as far as it can take coguisance of them. Crimes against poverty, crimes against the person, crimes of indifference, of inhumanity, of selfishness, of greed, of dishonesty, have had and still have the control of society, and there are vast lines of demarcation between man and man.

It is possible by legal expedients to compel a recognition, in part, of other people's rights. It is possible to padlock the lips of the slanderer that he may not destroy another person's reputation. It is possible to stop the murderer in the act of his crime, or punish him after the crime is done, for the warning of society. But it is not possible for these expedients to limit by one hair's breadth the experience of hatred and bitterness which crops out in these crimes. Where, in all the efforts of this world's thought and force, has a true brotherhood been established? Where are men so associated and related that they know what unity actually means? Dear friends, it is love alone which is the solvent of these elements of antagonism. It is only Divine love, which has wooed the world back to itself in the person and mission of Jesus Christ, that can ever marry men to one another; wed them in their interests and in their mutual devotion and appreciation. And so our Lord in the parable makes the central hero a Samaritan, the least of all men in the estimate of a Jew. He shows that fellowship of faith, with a lack of love, was insufficient. The priest and the Levite, although they had everything but love, yet confessed themselves unequal to the emergency. They passed by on the other side. And then, by contrast, he shows the lawyer how true love can break down even the malignity of revenge for insults and injuries; how a Samaritan who has been cursed can forgive all that, and minister to a man dying, because he is a man.

It is only that love that was manifested in Jesus Christ that can make a man neighbourly. It is only as it goes out from one heart to another, and spreads through a people, that a true community, a sympathy, a true mutual helpfulness is possible. Oh, what a family is that which the Gospel produces! Language does not divide them; for there is a name which is the same in every speech, and every heart thrills at its mention.

I shall never forget a prayer-meeting that I attended in London, in 1862, at which delegates from all parts of the Continent were present. A German, a French, an Italian, a Spanish delegate at different times took part in the exercises, and I, poor, ignorant Christian, could not understand their exhortation, or their prayers. But when each, in the peculiar inflection of his own tongue, came to the name above every name-Jesu, Jesus-there was a thrill that my heart responded to, which proved us to be brothers in the regeneration, and demonstrated that the same love that God had by his Spirit put in my heart, also ruled in their hearts. Nationality does not separate. Religious customs are