written expressly of a controversial character, we have no means of determining to what section of dissenters he pertained. The discourse of the Light of Nature is an expansion of that sentiment of Solomon, "The spirit of man is the candle of the Lord;" and the great principle which this learned and powerful young author sustains is, that every man, in every possible state of religious destitution, and whatever may be the grade of his mental culture, is the possessor of a moral nature given to him by the great Creator-a moral sense, rendering him capable of distinguishing between good and evil, to an extent which makes him the proper subject of commands, promises, and threatenings. The volume is unquestionably good in its general bearing: it abounds with thinking of no ordinary degree of power, and is calculated to aid the great cause of morals and religion. It is full of quotations, apt and well arranged, from all the profound thinkers of Greece and Rome, proving at once the extent and accuracy of the writer's learning. The style, though often very felicitous, and amply evincing the copia verborum of a well-furnished mind, is yet, in our opinion, too luxuriant for a philosophical essay; it is, as the Greville would phrase it, "a booke of poesie in prose compil'd." It is too replete with the figures of oratory, and the dazzling imagery of a vigorous and unchastened fancy, to be a fit vehicle for reasoning. In the happiest efforts of the fervid genius of Culverwell, he occasionally bears a very close resemblance to a contemporaneous fellow of the same university, the learned Platonist, John Smith, whose Select Discourses are amongst the most eloquent remains of the theology of that period; but in the architecture of Smith there is a solidity, a compactness, a strength, which well support the rich superincumbency of his varied ornaments, and which we look for in vain in the Corinthian elegance of Culverwell. But when we remember that the latter died before a maturity of judgment enabled him to prune the expletives of his prolific imagination, we shall rather be inclined to admire the luxuriance of the harvest, than complain of the display of gaudy and useless weeds which attest the richness of the soil, though they deteriorate the value of the crop. Considering the general character of this volume, we are disposed to wonder at the little notice it appears to have attracted amongst its contemporaries. Perhaps the neglect of it by Dissenters may be attributed to its departure from the usual routine of puritan theology, and to its secession from the rigidness of Calvinistic orthodoxy, though Culverwell was, on the whole, a moderate Calvinist; and the Episcopalians, to whom its merits as a literary composition might be presumed to have made it acceptable, were too much embittered against the Dissenters in the period immediately following its publication, to permit them to read any production of that school with the least degree of satisfaction, or even candour. As we have always observed that the skeleton of a book is precisely that subject of anatomical skill which is viewed with the least interest by the generality of readers, we shall not venture on any syllabus of the arguments adduced in this work, but adopt, in preference, the plan of offering an integral portion of the author himself, animated with the very life, and speaking in the same words, in which he originally delivered his thoughts. "The light of reason a pleasant light. "All light is pleasant; 'tis the very smile of nature, the gloss of the world, the varnish of the creation, a bright paraphrase upon bodies. Whether it discover itself in the modesty of a morning blush, and open its fair, and virgin eyelids in the dawning of the day; or whether it dart out more vigorous, and sprightful beams, shining out in its noon-day glory; whether it sport, and twinkle in a star; or blaze, and glare out in a comet; or frisk, and dance in a jewel; or dissemble, and play the hypocrite in a glowworm; or epitomize, and abbreviate itself in a spark; or shew its zeal, and the ruddinesse of its complexion, in the yolk of the fire; or grow more pale, pining, and consuming away in a candle: however 'tis pleased to manifest itself, it carries a commanding lustre in its face; though sometimes indeed it be veiled, and shadowed; sometimes 'tis clouded, and imprisoned; sometimes 'tis soyled, and discoloured. Who will not salute so lovely a beauty with a Xaîpe pws. Welcome, thou first-born of corporeal beings; thou lady, and queen of sensitive beauties; thou clarifier, and refiner of the chaos, thou unspotted beauty of the universe: let him be condemned to a perpetual night, to a fatal, disconsolate grave, that is not enamoured with thy brightnesse. Is it not a pleasant thing to behold a sun? nay, to behold but a candle, a deputed light? a vicarious light, the ape of a sun-beam? Yea, there are some superstitious ones that are ready to adore it. How devoutly do they complement with a candle, at the first approach? How do they put off the hat to it, as if, with the satyr, they meant to kiss it? You see how pleasant the light is to them. Nay, that learned knight, in his discourse of bodies, tells us of one totally blind, who yet knew when a candle came into the room, onely by the quickening, and reviving of his spirits. Yet this corporeal light, 'tis but a shadow, 'tis but a black spot to set off the fairnesse of intellectual brightnesse. How pleasant is it to behold an intellectual sun? nay, to behold but the candle of the Lord?' How pleasant is this lamp of reason!" The above extract is a specimen of the prettinesses with which the whole Discourse abounds; yet that amidst all these corruscations of his genius, the author could pursue a close and cogent train of argument the following extract is a proof. "The superiority of the gospel to the law, and of faith to reason. "The very principles of christian religion are attractive and magnetical: they enamour, and command; they overpower the understanding, and make it glad to look upon such mysterious truths, as are reflected in a glass; because it is unable to behold them πρόσωπον πρός πρόσωπον, face to face. This speaks the great pre-eminence of Mount Sion above Mount Sinai. In the law, you have the "candle of the Lord" shining; in the gospel, you have the day-spring from on high," the " sun arising," Nature and reason triumph in the law, grace and faith flower out in the gospel. By virtue of this wise and free dispensation, weak ones chiefly receive the gospel; for they are as 66 : well able to believe as any other: nay, they are apter to believe than others. If it had gone onely by the advancement of intellectuals, by the hightnings and clarifyings of reason; who then would have been saved but the grandees of the world, the scribes, the Pharisees, the philosophers, the disputers? But God has framed a way that confounds those heads of the world, and drops happinesse into the mouths of babes. There are some understandings that neither spin nor toil; and yet Solomon, in all his wisdom and glory, was not cloathed like one of these; for this way of faith is a more brief and compendious way. Very few understandings, much less all, can demonstrate all that is demonstrable: but, if men have a power of believing, they may presently assent to all that's true and certain. All men in the world have not equal abilities, opportunities, advantages, of improving their reason, even in things natural, and moral: so that reason itself tells us that these are in some measure necessitated to believe others. How many are there that cannot measure the just magnitude of a star; yet, if they will believe an astronomer, they may know it presently and if they be sure that this mathematician hath skill enough, and will speak nothing but the truth, they cannot then have the least shadow of reason to disbelieve him. 'Tis thus in spirituals: such is the weakness of humane understanding, as that they are necessitated to believing here; yet such is its happinesse, that it hath one to instruct it who can neither deceive nor be deceived. God hath chosen this way of faith, that he may stain the pride and glory of man; that he may pose his intellectuals; that God may maintain in man great apprehensions of himself, of his own incomprehensibleness, of his own truth, of his own revelation; as that he may keep a creature in a posture of dependency, so as to give up his understanding, so as to be disposed, and regulated by him. And if cherubim be ambitious of stooping, if an angelical understanding does so earnestly aрakúα-desire to look into those things, methinks then the sons of men might fall down at the beautiful feet of evangelical mysteries, with that humble acknowledgment, Non sum dignus solvere corrigiam hujus mysterii-I am not worthy to know the meaning of this mystery. Only let thy faith triumph here, for it shall not triumph hereafter: let it shine in time; for it must vanish in eternity. You see then, that reason is no enemy to faith for all that has been said of faith has been fetched out of reason. You see there are mutual embraces betwixt the law and the gospel: nature and grace may meet together; reason and faith have kissed each other." THE CALL. HARK! to the freshening breeze of morn! The battle-peal of heaven and hell! Inhale the hurrying breath of morn! Though bland, sin's pestilence it brings; Die like the brute beneath its wings! Take-take of Gilead's balm : Say to the broken heart, “ Be whole ;" O'er boundless fields the breeze of morn Because the labourers are few." LONDON: PRINTED BY IBOTSON AND PALMER, SAVOY STREET. |