to Mr. Jowett, he meant to say, when he 80 whimsical as this? In answer to the hypothesis itself, we will only remind our readers that the Galatians received the Gospel from St. Paul a short time before the Thessalonians; and that when he wrote his Epistle to the Galatians (about the same time with 2 Cor.) he certainly was not aware that his views of the Gospel had altered so fundamentally On the contrary, he tells them, Though I myself (usis) or an angel from heaven should preach to you a Gospel different from that which I preached to you, let him be accursed.' And throughout the Epistle he repeatedly recurs to this assertion, that the Gospel which they at first received from him was the true and the only Gospel. If Mr. Jowett's opinion were correct, how easily might they have retorted upon the apostle: When you first came among us, you made the essence of the Gospel to consist, not in the belief in Christ, but in the hope of his coming again.' Since, however, Mr. Jowett believes that St. Paul so rapidly and fundamentally changed his own doctrines, there is no wonder that he should believe him to have differed from the doctrine of the other Apostles. This opinion he thus expresses: 'Amid such fluctuation and variety of opinions we can imagine Paul and Apollos, or Paul and Peter, preaching side by side in the church of Corinth or of Antioch, like Wesley and Whitfield in the last century, or Luther and Calvin at the Reformation, with a sincere reverence for each other, not abstaining from commenting on or condemning each other's doctrine or practice, and yet also forgetting their differences in their common zeal to save the souls of men. Personal regard is quite consistent with differences of religious belief.-i. 337. very It may be replied that there is no evidence of any difference of religious belief between the Apostles. Nay, on the occasion when St. Paul rebuked St. Peter for his timid practice, he founded his rebuke upon their agreement in doctrine. See Gal. ii. 14-17. Mr. Williams, in his 'Rational Godliness,' gives an estimate of the authority of the Apostles no higher than that of Mr. Jowett. His view may be gathered from the following passages : and they professed only to know in part, and to prophesy in part. Yet God has not given us any higher written authority.'-(Rational Godliness, p. 59.) Nor would it be modest to weigh the personal authority of even the most spiritual teacher now against that of the Apostles who followed Christ; but yet we need not suppose that the arm of the Eternal is shortened, or that His Holy Spirit ever ceases to animate the devout heart.'(ib. p. 298.) old is for ever a living and a present power, its If that Spirit by which holy men spake of later lessons may well transcend its earlier; and there may reside in the Church a power of bringing out of her treasury things new as well as things old.'-(ib. p. 289.) 'It may be that the Lord writes the Bible on the same principle as the Lord builds the city; or that He teaches the Psalmist to sing in the same sense as He teaches his fingers to fight; buted to the Almighty just as sowing and thus, that the composition of Scripture is attrithrashing are said to be taught by Him.'-(ib. p. 292. Whence it follows that the doctrines and precepts of the Apostles are as likely to be incorrect as the methods of rural economy practised by their contemporaries; and that they may be surpassed as completely by the modern church as the agriculture of Palestine is surpassed by the agriculture of Scotland. After all this, it is really a comfort to be informed that 'The Church of our own land has stamped it [the Scriptures] with authority, by adopting it as her written law.'-(Rational Godliness, p. 288.) So that we may still regard the New Testament as invested with the same authority as the Canons of Convocation. a Some theologians have attempted to draw distinction between the written and the oral teaching of the Apostles. The authors before us make no such separation, but think the founders of our religion equally fallible, whether they wrote or spoke. Mr. Jowett's estimate of St. Paul is lower in this respect than any we have before seen. He tells us of the Apostle, that in his manner of teaching he wavers between opposite views or precepts in successive verses' (i. 291). And, again, that he seems to desert his original standingground, and to alternate between the two sides of his own mind' (ii. 110); with many other statements to the same effect, which, however, may perhaps be meant only to On this ground that the Apostles generally indicate that St. Paul unconsciously acted saw our Lord, and had the best means of information as to his religion, their writings seem upon 'doctrine of contrathe Hegelian to be properly added to those of the Old Testa diction.' But he is also guilty, we are told, ment, which they explain. They were men, in- of frequent awkwardness of expression deed, compassed with infirmities like ourselves, (ii. 124); was 'incapable of mastering the VOL. XCVIII. 7 language in which he wrote' (ii. 146);, the following utterance of Mr. Emer'could not distinguish argument from illus- son :tration' (i. 284,* and ii. 180); and is constantly guilty of the opposition of particles, not of ideas' (ii. 63). He was remarkable for an absence of human knowledge (i. 295). He could not, consistently with the modes of thought of his age,' distinguish between 'moral evil and ceremonial impurity' (ii. 118); and it is very doubtful, as we have seen, whether he was capable of weighing evidence' (i. 300). Besides these defects, most of which he derived, we perceive, from the modes of thought of his age,' other peculiarities personal to himself are ascribed to the Apostle. In the first place, he is represented as absorbed in a continual state of vision and ecstacy, whether in the body or out of the body he could not tell; § living in a 'twilight' between this world and the next. He must have appeared to the rest of mankind like a visionary,' and is compared to the ecstatic saints of the middle ages (i. 298). And the revelations which he received for his personal guidance are likened to the intimations of the Demon of Socrates. || We confess that this, together with a note on the term Revelation at Gal. i. 12, reminds us painfully of 6 *This incapacity, however, he shared (we are here told) with his contemporaries; for to an Alexandrian writer of the first century the question itself [whether this is an argument or an illus tration] could hardly have been made intelligible.' Such is the power of modes of thought I' This is another example of the rash assertions with which this book abounds. St. Paul, far from being destitute of human knowledge, had received the most elaborate Rabbinical education, under Gamaliel, the most celebrated of the Jewish Rabbis; and that he was not ignorant of Greek literature is proved by the occurrence of three quotations from Greek poets in the extant portion of his works. + It may be further maintained, not only that there was no such distinction in the mind of the apostle, but that, consistently with the modes of thought of his age, there could not have been such. ** * When a Jew spoke of the law, it never occurred to him to ask whether he meant the moral or ceremonial law; or when he spoke of sin, to distinguish whether he intended moral evil or ceremonial impurity.'-ii, 118. § St. Paul uses this expression once, to describe his impression of a single vision; Mr. Jowett constantly refers to it as representing the apostle's habitual state of mind. 'Karà dпokáλviv, by revelation. Comp. i. 12, and Acts xvi. 8. The apostle means, that he went up, not because he was sent for, but because it was revealed to him that he should go. Compare, so far as a heathen parallel is in point, the dapóvtov onusion of Socrates, which in the same way gave intimations respecting his going out and coming in.' -Note on Gal. ii. 2. 'We distinguish the announcements of the soul, its manifestations of its own nature, by the term Revelation. These are always attended by the emotion of the sublime; for this communication is an influx of the Divine mind into our mind. . . . The character and duration of this enthusiasm varies with the state of the individual; from an ecstacy, a trance, and prophetic inspiration, to the faintest glow of virtuous emotion. A certain tendency to insanity has always attended the opening of the religious The trances of Socrates, the union of Plotinus, sense in men, as if blasted with excess of light. the vision of Porphyry, the conversion of Paul, the aurora of Behmen, the convulsions of George Fox, the illumination of Swedenborg, are of this kind.' .'-(Emerson's Oversoul.) Connected with this topic is Mr. Jowett's singular suggestion that the Apostle was 'afflicted with palsy' (i. 303). From what he says in vol. ii. p. 206, it that appears he grounds this hypothesis on St. Paul's use of the words 'fear and trembling,' as describing his own state during the first visit to Corinth. But Mr. Jowett surely forgot that this peculiar Pauline expression occurs four times (1 Cor. ii. 3; 2 Cor. vii. 15; Eph. vi. 5; Phil. ii. 12); and that once only is it used of St. Paul himself. In all the four passages it is used to express eager anxiety such as would be sometimes called in English tremulous eagerness.' For instance, the Philippians are exhorted to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling,' which Mr. Jowett could hardly interpret as a desire that they might all be smitten with paralysis. Had he remembered that palsy impairs the mental powers, we think he would have abstained from this suggestion. 6 Not less painful are the following negations: He who felt the whole creation groaning and travailing together until now, was not like the Greek drinking in the life of nature at every pore. He who through Christ was crucified to the world, and the world to him, was not in harmony with nature, nor nature with him. The manly form, the erect step, the fulness of life and beauty, could not have gone along with such a consciousness as this; any more than the taste for literature and art could have consisted with the thought, "not many wise, not many learned, not many mighty."—i. 299. Had Pascal no taste for literature? Nay, have we not lately learned how Ampére lived and died with the Imitatio Christi in his heart and on his lips ?*. See the biographical notice of Ampére in the Ampére, whose capacious intellect compre- | exception for the custom of our courts of law. . [An exception made by our Lord himself, when So in the note upon the precept, 'Revenge not yourselves,' we read hended the whole cycle of human know- stops its ears against the groans of the creation, and can prophesy nothing better than an eternal repetition of this miserable existence ? * We now come to the third and last of the above-mentioned subsidiary propositions, namely Prop. 3. The morality of the New Testament is erroneous.' Unbelievers, though differing infinitely among themselves upon all questions of practical morality, yet are agreed in thinking themselves competent to sit in judgment upon the Christian standard of ethics, and to pronounce it defective. And even the Christian writers before us have expressed themselves as though they meant to concur in such an imputation. Thus Mr. Jowett says 'Many are the texts which we either silently drop or insensibly modify, with which the spirit of modern society seems almost unavoidably to be at variance. The blessing on the poor, and the "hard sayings" respecting rich men, are not in accordance even with the better mind of the present age. We cannot follow the simple precept "Swear not at all," without making an Éloges of Arago, noticed in the last number of the Mr. Jowett, as we see by his commentary, has not apprehended the argument of St. Paul in the noble passage to which he refers-an argument no less original than profound. The very struggles which all animated beings make against pain and death show, says the apostle, that pain and death are not a part of the proper laws of their nature, but a bondage imposed upon them from without; and thus the very struggle is a prophecy of future triumph. The principle here laid down may be sometimes a counsel of perfection; that is to say, a principle which, in the mixed state of human things, it is impossible to carry out in practice." -ii. 308. which the act is done; according to the Mr. Williams seems to think the standard: of Pauline morality much below that to 'Some have defended slavery, because they truly observe that St. Paul's Epistles do defend it, and even condemn attempts to abolish it as the work of men "proud, knowing nothing" (1 Tim. vi. 2-4).' as This is a very glaring misinterpretation, . a glance at the original will prove, though the faulty translation of repor didadxaλs in the Authorised Version may seem to countenance it. St. Paul, in the passage referred to, is speaking of the heretical teachers against whom the epistle is directed. There was no abolitionist party' in the Roman Empire under the reign of Nero. And as to defending slaof slaves and masters under their existing very,' while St. Paul speaks of the duties relations, he lays down principles destined to abolish it; and in the very epistle here misquoted, he classes slave-dealers* among the worst of criminals (1 Tim. i. 10). Mr. Williams, however, shuts his eyes to this, and endeavours to make St. Paul a defender of slavery, for the sake of establishing a position that our religion is one thing, and the books which record it are another.'-(Rutional Godliness, p. 303.) Mr. Jowett also appears to countenance *'Avdpamodiorais, which is inadequately translated in the Authorised Version. 6 1 the belief that the morality of the Gospel | tably moral? Can they, in the first place, is behind that of the age, in the following from the moral instincts or intuitions (which passage: confessedly give no verdict on details) in- have just quoted? In the hour of tempta- the elaborate deductions of ethical treatises, The only result of such views as those Is this true? Let us recall to mind of the authors before us,* * is to reduce the some of the moral rules of Scripture. The Christian revelation to the level of a hufirst that occur to us are such as these-man philosophy. If we ascribe no positive Lie not one to another'-' Forgive your enemies'-' Put not away your wives'Steal no more, but rather labour' Be ye kind one to another'-' Fornication and all uncleanness, let it not be once named among you.' Is it true that these rules are not separable from the circumstances under which they were given? Is it true that their applicability is restricted to the cases of the first converts? Is it true that they are now not applicable to individual cases? Nay, is not the reverse of Mr. Jowett's maxim true? Should we not rather say, the moral rules of the New Testament are universal rules, and may still be applied as of old to our own individual cases? It is certain that a complete ethical code, entering into almost all the duties of domestic and social life, may be compiled from the New Testament; nay, many single epistles of St. Paul would furnish a large contribution to such a code. Can we suppose that this body of morality was incorporated into the Christian canon by accident? or merely put there to mislead mankind? authority to the teaching of Christ and his apostles; if we refuse to submit our private opinion to their doctrine, our private practice to their precepts; if, in short, we refuse to yield them the same submission which would reasonably be demanded from a human child towards his earthly father; it can only be because we do not really be lieve that they were commissioned to declare the will of God to man. If the founders of our faith were supernaturally empowered to found it, their faith must be received in silence as our own; if not, they are no more to us than Plato or Confucius. It is vain to say with Mr. Jowett, *It is needless for us, after the discussion it has provoked, to say a word on Mr. Jowett's Dissertation than any other portion of his book, further than to on the Atonement, which has excited more sensation remark that it is taken almost verbatim et literatim out of the Aids to Reflection of Coleridge (pp. 257-270). Mr. Jowett might perhaps have expect ed that the reading public would recognise a portion of so remarkable and so well-known a work. But the immense over growth of modern literature is continually burying itself (Romam sub Roma'); and not one book in a million can But it is argued that morality is immu- now be remembered twenty years after it is published. There is, however, one difference between table, and cannot be altered, even by Di- Coleridge's mode of treating the subject and that vine enactment; and this, no doubt, is the of Mr. Jowett, viz. that the former speaks with feeling which inclines Mr. Jowett and reverential awe and gentleness of the received others to deny the existence of a code of opinions, which the latter might at least have imipositive morality in Scripture. We do not tated. Nor can we even fully understand the consistency of Mr. Jowett's objections; for Justice, dispute the immutability of morality; but Mercy, and Expiation form a triad in precise aothe question is, whether men are immu-cordance with his own philosophy. he who leads the life of Paul has already say, that it may safely be left to the conset his seal that Paul's words are true,' if scientious judgment of the Christian to we only mean that Paul's words are true draw the line of separation; and that, if in when we happen to agree with him. It is some cases of minor importance some unvain to say with Mr. Williams (after deny- certainty may exist as to where the line. ing that our faith rests on miraculous evi- should fall, a similar or greater difficulty dence), Where then are our evidences? It will encounter him upon any other theory may be answered in two words-the cha- of inspiration. For we must never forget racter of Christ and the doctrine of Christ' that a creed without a difficulty is an im(p. 394). For, according to these views, possibility. We may be Pyrrhonians if we the doctrine of Christ is false, unless it be please, and suspend our judgment altocountersigned by the approval of our un-gether; but if that dreary blankness of derstanding; and even the character of soul cannot satisfy our spiritual instincts, Christ may be consistently disparaged by those who start from the premises of Mr. Newman.* But are we contending then, it may be asked, for that exploded doctrine of verbal inspiration which denies all human authorship to the sacred canon? Do we think it necessary for the safety of Christianity that the Apostles should have been infallible in all the matters of historical, archæological, astronomical, or topographical information to which they may casually allude? That be far from us. On the contrary, we quite agree with Mr. Williams, that the advocates of such a notion, which was utterly unknown to the primitive church, are most effectually doing the work of infidelity. There is much truth in what he says of them, that as for the many inquiries of great literary and historical interest which the criticism of the sacred volume involves, they have so pre-judged such questions, that they either will not acquire the knowledge requisite to answer them, or they even raise an outcry against the investigation of any more consistent student, as if it were a triumph of infidelity-and thereby they most unwisely make it so.' then, in choosing our standing point, the only question we have to answer is-where are the difficulties the fewest? Unless, indeed, we imagine that we can escape, with Hegel, from the perplexities which baffle our reason, by reducing them under a new denomination, and baptising them the moments of the idea!' 6 But we must not ignore another argument, which is brought in defence of the free criticism of our modern teachers. You admit,' they say, that the Apostles declared the teaching of the Old Testament to be imperfect, and its ethics to be superseded by a higher morality; why may not we claim the same liberty of judging the teaching of the Apostolic age, which that age itself exercised respecting the inspired teachers of their fathers? We answer that, if our new instructors possess the same divine authority as the Apostles, then, but not otherwise, they have the right to supersede the Apostolic teaching by their own. When St. Paul announced that the Law was done away in Christ, he claimed to speak with the voice and in the power of God. When our Lord passed sentence of imperfection on the moral precepts of Moses, it was because He was greater than Moses. But as that sentence which pronounced the Law imperfect virtually abolished Judaism, so would the revelation of religious error in the Gospel virtually aboChristianity. The opinion which we maintain is very different from that of these worshippers of the letter. Our ground is briefly this: that if Christianity be a Divine revelation at all, then the messengers divinely commission-lish ed to reveal it must be authoritative in the subj ct matter of the revelation-that is, in religious and moral truth. Nor, if we may venture to judge of the future by the past, will such new reliany But it may be alleged that, if we give up attention of mankind, unless it appeals to gion ever fix the belief, or even arrest the the verbal infallibility, we cannot accusome supernatural attestation. Metaphysirately distinguish, in every case, between cians may tell the world that it ought not the two elements, the human and the di- to ascribe spiritual value to outward wonvine, which we acknowledge to co-exist. ders; they may even allege that no exterAs this difficulty was answered in an Arti-nal revelation can be authoritative in matcle which appeared not long since in the ters of religion or morality. But they Quarterly Review,'t we need now only will talk in vain. They are refuted by the whole course of history, and by the nature of man. And thus we see, in fact, that See the chapter on the Moral Imperfection of Christ, in Newman's Phases of Faith.' On the Eclipse of Faith, in the Quarterly Review for September, 1854. those who adopt the system we have de scribed-those who think the doctrines of |