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Our investigation may aserer for art thenga dogmatism which, professing advered to the ver

Holy Scripture, departs from than ve talep yanatice of the real meaning: and case the virt pure, wise, loving, chefens baz

accepted of God.

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At the outset we encounter & puding truth: the Bible, neither teaching science, nor with faally, has wellnigh for ever seemed against the semiar science of the age, yet the Old Book and the C14 Fes unive. Not only so, theologians have been among the first to point out astro

sun, the stars, the planets, are "brilliants floating in an upper æther," to light us in that pathway of the just which shineth more and more unto perfect day. Beside all this, we have the loving influence of human soul on human soul. We are conscious of a baptism and consecration in which the true belief of holy men binds us to purity and rectitude. Blessed influence, not calculable by algebra, not deducible by logic; mysterious, effectual, mighty, as the hidden processes by which life is quickened. Words are but poor ghosts of the grand reality of things that make themselves felt as if they were our flesh. They breathe upon us with warm breath, they touch us with responsive hands, look at us with sincere glad eyes. The presence of soul to soul is a power filling with emotion, attractive as flame to flame, drawing with gentle compulsion to the sweet enjoyment of union with the Lord.

For this union we are being prepared by the existing variety in Nature. Eternal Energy is not limited to natural uniformity, but comes forth in all changes of the world's ever-varying forces. Similar antecedents do not always determine similar consequents. Involution and evolution of a Divine character advance by manifestations increasingly unlike their precedents. From chaos went forth creation, out of the dead came the living. From the present creation and the present life, by different degrees in Nature, as lower steps to the higher, we shall ascend those glorious heights, whither Divine thought and work successively conduct. No wonder that our discipline is somewhat sharp, for the destiny before us is very splendid, and in the coming hallowed glory that our Creed tells us of the universe will never lose its soul of loveliness.

"My spirit was entranced

With joy exalted to beatitude;

The measure of my soul was filled with bliss,
And holiest love; as earth, sea, air, with light,
With pomp, with glory, with magnificence."

William Wordsworth.

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WE propose to investigate certain statements made by a few scientific men concerning Scripture. If the inquiry should prove that remarkable fact—“the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Cor. ii. 14)—it may lead them and us to a more reverent heed of that which God has spoken by the prophets, and by His Son Jesus; that the world may be full of a revealed Deity, yet the outside manifestation exercise little or no influence for good, unless it awakens the conscience and regenerates the affections.

Our investigation may also correct that hard theological dogmatism which, professing adherence to the very letter of Holy Scripture, departs from that letter through ignorance of the real meaning; and violates the spirit through want of that pure, wise, loving, obedient heart, without which no one is accepted of God.

At the outset we encounter a puzzling truth: the Bible, neither teaching science, nor written scientifically, has wellnigh for ever seemed against the secular science of the age, yet the Old Book and the Old Faith survive. Not only so, theologians have been among the first to point out astro

nomical and other difficulties in the Bible; while the greatest astronomers and most renowned physicists always assert that Mind planned the world, its processes and laws having interpretation by intelligence as they are the manifestation of Intelligence. To mention only two-who can doubt Newton's piety, or distrust the simple child-like faith of Copernicus?

The oppositions of Science in one age against Scripture have generally been removed in the next, and though the time for full mutual reconciliation and verifying has not arrived the mechanism of the world not being wholly revealed, and the best of us "stretching but lame hands of faith"-the ablest men have a growing and abiding conviction that intelligence and piety unite in the perfect man.

The objectors of old were acute as are objectors now. Ancient heathens well handled, and then cast away as useless, the very weapons which men of our own day gather and refurbish. The Jews, long ago, by pseudo-criticism, did all well-nigh that could be done against the Messianic Prophecies; but those Prophecies yet testify and truly.

The complaint that science was not Divinely taught is evidently unreasonable "If the Jews had been told that water existed in the clouds in small drops, they would have marvelled that it did not constantly descend; and to have explained the wisdom of this would have been to teach Atmology in the Sacred Writings. If they had read in their Scripture that the earth was a sphere, when it appeared to be a plane, they would only have been disturbed in their thoughts, or driven to some wild and baseless imaginations, by a declaration to them so strange. If the Divine Speaker, instead of saying that He would set His bow in the clouds, had been made to declare that He gave to water the property of refracting different colours at different angles, how utterly unmeaning to the hearers would the words have been!" It is not for the sake of physical science; but for the eternal problems which lie behind all natural phenomena, and are unaffected and unchanged despite all

D.D.

"Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences," vol. i. p. 686: Rev. W. Whewell,

Bible as viewed in Different Ages.

433

other changes; that the world reverently holds in her hand the ancient Book, and makes an effort to understand her childhood.

Some parts of the Bible have always seemed more adapted to particular periods; and, conversely, some more opposed. In the Crusaders' times such words as-"Take up the Cross," "Glory in the Cross," filled every mouth. During Puritan days, the New Testament being greatly neglected, the Old was all in all. Now the Old is neglected, and some parts are furiously assailed under the mask of science. We have no Ulphilas to take away the oкavdáλā, or stones of stumbling,1 even if we needed one: but as Abbot Joachim's prophetic book of the Everlasting Gospel is forgotten,2 and the attacks of Voltaire and his literary progeny, wicked as witty, are disregarded; we, reviewing the past, are sure that speech of the following sort will soon be silenced:-" Revealed Religion is on its trial before the world. The question is not so much whether we shall recite the damnatory clauses in our Athanasian Creed, as whether any creed whatever is worth reciting. Christianity is on its trial before the world, not for some trifling blemishes which a little mild correction may mend, but for its very life; and if the clergy, its natural defenders, can show no intelligible reason why it should stand, common sense, in this country at least, will very speedily decide upon its merits in a somewhat rough-and-ready fashion." This writer mistakes the errors of believers for faults in the grand old Faith Christianity is not on trial-men are on trial by Christianity, not Christianity by men. Our blessed Lord did

not make every one pleased with religion, or with Him; and those who expect Christianity to answer riddles before the riddles are made, must themselves answer this riddle-that despite the opposition of secularists, "no amount of knowledge, of the kind which alone physical science can impart, can do more than widen the foundation of intelligent spiritual belief." 4

1 Dean Milman's "Gibbon," small edition, vol. iv. chap. xxxviii. p. 322.

2 Dean Milman's "Latin Christianity," 8vo, vol. viii. book xii. chap. vi. p. 347.

"Modern Christianity a Civilised Heathenism," Preface to second edition.

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