us by God, are injuries, or no penalties, because we are innocent. 5. And that God's denying us any helps of his Spirit, and permitting the remnant of our sin yet unhealed, and the weakness of our graces, are an injurious denying us our right. 6. It would follow, that we have present right to the present possession of the whole reward, both grace and glory, and that our delay is our wrong; because he that is supposed to have done all that the law maketh his duty, from his birth till his death, hath right to the reward by the law or covenant. 7. And, it would follow, that no duty could be required of us as a condition of any benefit purchased by Christ, nor any sin charged on us so far as to be indeed our sin, because we are reputed perfectly holy and innocent."1 In agreement with these explanations of righteousness, Mr. Baxter defines justification as consisting of three parts. He supposes it to mean, first, "making us righteous and judicially justifiable." This he terms "constitutive justification." "Constitutive justification is ever first. God never judged a man righteous, that was not righteous." The word 'righteous' and 'righteousness' is so frequently used in Scripture for that called inherent or self-performed righteousness (incomparably ofter than in any other sense), as will help to inform us what constitutive justification is; and, if. any dislike the name, let them call it 'making us righteous,' if that will please them better than the word justifying." "If any, with Augustine, will mean by justification God's making us such as the Judge will justify by sentence or execution, then our conversion is part of that justification;" and the Scripture sometimes taketh justification in that sense." As the first is constitutive, so the second part of justification is judicial, and consists in the plea, the evidence and witness, and the sentence, that we are righteous according to the law of grace. The third part is executive justification, the treating of us as righteous. "It is by the law of grace (the edition which men lived under) that Christ will judge the world,” and while “no man is perfectly and absolutely just or justifiable by the law of innocency," yet "a believer is made just indeed, and so is justifiable in judgment, that is, justified virtually by the law" of the redemptive economy.* "The faith that hath the promise of justification is essentially a subjecting ourselves to Christ; that is, a taking him for our Lord and Saviour by consent; which is a consent to obey him for the future. Though this actual obedience 1 Chap. XXII. §§ 21—28. 3 Ib. § 50. 2 Chap. XXI. §§ 25—28. to Christ, besides subjection, be not prerequisite to our first being justified, it is requisite to the continuance of our justification; for we consented to obey, that we might indeed obey, and are perfidious if we do not."1 "God calleth it his justice to reward men according to his law, and give them what it gave them right to. Insomuch that it is made the second article of our faith, Heb. 11: 6, to believe that God is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him. And he giveth it as a righteous judge, 2 Tim. 4: 8.”2 § 12. Saints' Perseverance. The following are the questions proposed by Baxter on this theme, and his answers to them. First, Is all the grace procured and given by Christ, such as is never lost? No. Secondly, Is that grace ever lost, which gives to the adult a moral power to believe without giving him the actual belief? Yes. Thirdly, Do any men lose true actual faith and justification? "I do not know." "For many hundred years the Christian doctors commonly held, that some lose true justifying faith and perish.” Fourthly, Is habitual love or holiness ever lost? "That there is a confirmed state or degree of holiness that is never lost, I do hold." But whether the least degrees of habitual grace be utterly loseable, which prove a present right to life till they are lost, I must precisely profess I do not know; much may be said on both sides; and if my ignorance offend any, it offendeth me more." Fifthly, Is it possible to lose that holiness which never will be lost? Men have the natural power to lose it. Sixthly, Are any persons truly converted who are not elected to salvation? Augustine supposed that some are "truly sanctified and justified that are not elect, and so do not persevere." "I do not know" Seventhly, Does the doctrine of apostasy infer any mutability in God? No; the change is only in the apostate. Eighthly, "Why did God leave this case so dark?" "It is not a matter of so great use to us as some imagine." "The difficulty of the point is such, that it should in all churches be left free, and neither side made necessary to our Christian love, peace, concord, communion, or ministry." "Before Augustine's time it was taken commonly as granted, that men might fall away from 1 Chap. XXV. §§ 15, 16. 2 Ib. § 43. Here Baxter makes a distinction, common among the old writers, between the first act of the renewed soul, its first consecration to God, and, on the other hand, its obedience. a state of grace, and that many did." Augustine, Prosper, Fulgentius, Macarius believed that "none of the elect did so fall as to perish;" but they all took it for granted, that some [of the nonelect were sanctified and] fell from a state of justification and perished. And I remember not one writer that I have read and noted, to be of a contrary mind for a thousand years after the writing of the Scriptures, nor any mention of any Christian sect that was so."1 In his treatment of the Saints' Perseverance, as of other themes, Baxter exhibited his peculiar distrust in the powers of the human mind. He shrunk from all dogmatical judgments on propositions which he regarded as not expressly revealed in the Divine word. At the same time, he encouraged the most resolute inquiry in all departments of theological investigation. The "End of Controversy" evinces his perseverance in free investigation untrammelled by uninspired creeds. His modest estimate of the human faculties forbade all blind submission to human compends of doctrine. In many respects his theological system appears to have been erroneous, even in the form which he gave it during the very year of his death. Some, at least, of his errors, he would probably have corrected, had he lived in the nineteenth century. Still, it is a system instinct with life and energy. It is distinguished, as the reader will perceive in the admirable abstract given of it in the ninth volume of this Review, by a spirit of profound penitence for transgression, and of hearty gratitude for the largeness and liberality of divine grace. Everywhere he describes sin as a bitter evil, because a free, voluntary, radical state. Everywhere, he describes the grace of God as abundant and wonderful, because it gives to all men all needed facilities for salvation, and is rich in its provisions for the nonelect as well as the elect. Everywhere he seems to be mindful of his own liabilities to error, and, therefore, anxious to cherish in his own and in other minds, the spirit of genuine catholicism. He is often sarcastic, but he reserves his severity for men who strive to oppress the mind, and overload "the bruised reed" with a cumbrous machinery of human speculations. Notwithstanding all his theological mistakes, it is easy to perceive the influence of his abstract creed upon his practical and devotional treatises. The animating, inspiriting, invigorating tone of his speculations 1 Chap. XXII. cannot be hidden in his hortatory appeals. The genius of his scholastic theology is apparent in his " Call to the Unconverted," and in his “Saints' Everlasting Rest." So thoroughly does the most abstruse science permeate the most familiar habits of thought and feeling. ARTICLE VIII. THE CONSERVATIVE USE OF THE EYES, ESPECIALLY IN REFERENCE TO THE DISEASE KNOWN AS MORBID By George A. Bethune, M. D., one of the Surgeons of the Massachusetts Charitable Eye and Ear Infirmary. THAT disease of the eyes, which we regard as the great scourge of literary men, is known among physicians as the Morbid Sensibility of the Retina. This term gives but an imperfect idea of the disease, as the most annoying sensations are felt in parts of the body which have only sympathetic relations with the retina, an organ which, as is well known, forms a part of the vital machinery of vision, and which, probably, has no capacity for sensation other than that concerned in sight.1 This disease, in fact, consists of an over sensitiveness of the general nervous system of the eye, with its appendages and its neighborhood, especially of that part on, behind, and above its surface, and that of the living membrane of the lids. The uneasy or painful sensations are, it is true, produced by the exposure of the retina to the light in the discharge of its duty; at least, this is the ordinary succession of events, though the painful sensations are sometimes present when the organ is wholly at rest; but the sensations themselves are not in the retina, but in other parts. We wish to insist a little on this point, as connected with means for warding off attacks of disease. 1 Sir Charles Bell says: "The nerve of vision is as insensible to touch, as the nerve of touch is to light." There is, also, occasionally, in addition, a blur or failure of distinct vision, floating specs before the eyes, etc.; but these form no necessary part of the disease. Besides the optic nerve and its expansion, the retina of the eye receives nerves from more sources than any other organ of the body. Of the ten nerves which go off from the brain, six are distributed wholly, and the other four partially, to the eye, which, therefore, as may be readily inferred, suffers promptly and keenly from the misbehavior of its allies and neighbors, the other organs of the body. The stomach and bowels, the liver, the skin, the circulation, and, in general, all parts of the body, are more or less concerned in its healthy action, and in their turns are liable to be affected by its derangement. It becomes evident at once that, from its complex relations, the regulation of diet and regimen demands, were the eye only concerned, an attentive consideration. We have called the disease we are now discussing the especial scourge of students. We should, perhaps, have limited our remark to our own students. In Europe this disease has excited comparatively little attention, and is generally dismissed with a few lines in works on ophthalmic diseases. Why is it that in our land we suffer so much more, apparently, from that source? Perhaps some of the causes are beyond our observation. There are others, however, which force themselves on our notice, and should be kept in mind in attempting to ward off its approaches. In the first place, what is the general physical organization of men who devote themselves, with us, to literary pursuits, and particularly to the study of divinity? Physiologists and writers on health have taken pains to impress on the public the necessity, in choosing a profession, of taking one that in its exercise shall meet in some degree the bodily deficiencies. Yet we imagine that their advice is seldom followed, and that a man chooses a profession about as often as he does a wife, on physiological principles. The reason for this is very obvious, and that is, that other motives will almost always have a stronger controlling power. As a matter of speculation, he agrees to the propriety of such rules for the good of the race, but other and personal considerations will generally lead him to neglect them as regards himself. The thoughtful and meditative cast of mind which leads a man naturally to clerical pursuits, is not ordinarily found united to a robust and active frame. Such a man natu |