vineyard, and to implore His blessing upon their future efforts in their respective missionary fields. It pleased the Dean of Westminster Abbey, on that self-same day, to set at nought the appointed solemnities of INTERCESSION, and to neutralise the Christian missionary spirit which the services of the day may have animated throughout England and her dependencies. Be it borne in mind that, whatsoever is done or uttered, on certain appointed days, in our great churches, is, immediately after it is said or done, proclaimed by the press all over the civilised world. With an ironywhich was as gross as it was grotesque-the governor of that national religious fortress, using a scriptural figure of speech, surrendered the bulwark of our holy religion, which he was appointed to maintain and guard and watch over, into the hands of a canny, subtle, and insinuating enemy of the religion revealed by the only true God, and contained in the only SCRIPTURES of TRUTH, the only SURE WORD OF PROPHECY. The Dean of Westminster had invited that day Max Müller-whose scepticism in the Christian Scriptures is as well known to Christian students as his name is-Professor of Comparative Philology in the University of Oxford, to give his views on comparative theology, in the Cathedral of Westminster. The Professor responded to the call and, no doubt to Dr. Stanley's satisfaction, by implication ridiculed and laughed to scorn the idea that there was anything peculiarly or inherently or invincibly holy in the religion of the Bible, the Scriptures given by the inspiration of God. Almost in the words which Milton put into the mouth of the arch-enemy of God and man, when the fallen archangel dared to tempt the Angel of the Covenant, the Angel the Redeemer, the great Captain of our salvation. The preacher of a comparative theology of his own inspiration, held forth in effect, in the spirit, if not in the very words, of Milton's tempter : "All knowledge is not couch'd in Moses' law, That our readers may not suppose that our description of Professor Max Müller's discourse is unwarrantable, we proceed to furnish an analysis of it as it was published in the principal London papers. The Professor sets forth by classifying or cataloguing the religions of the world, and finds, according to his way of counting, that "the number of religions only amounts to eight. The Semitic races have produced threethe Jewish, the Christian, the Mohammedan." We would respectfully intimate to the lecturer that he is at fault here in his theory of comparative theology. The Semitic race has produced one religion only, and that is Judaism. Christianity is Judaism fully developed and perfected. Mohammedanism and Talmudical Judaism are simply monster deformities of Biblical Judaism. We prefer the comparative theology, on this point of the Hebrew Christian Benjamin Disraeli to that of the Oxford Professor of Comparative Philology. The accomplished author of "Lord George Bentinck: a Political Biography," speaking in the twenty-fourth chapter of the great Venetian statesman, thus apostrophises him :"Manini, who by the bye is a Jew who professes the whole of the JEWISH RELIGION, and believes in Calvary as well as Sinai,-' a converted Jew,' as the Lombards styled him, quite forgetting, in the confusion of ideas, that it is the Lombards who are the converts-not Manini." This is sound comparative theology, based on the positive declarations of the Old and New Testaments. We give a quotation to that effect from each :— "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the Lord but this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be My people. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more."* "God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son, whom He hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also He hath made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high. . . . But now hath He obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also He is the Mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises. For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second. For finding fault with them, He saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and * Jer. xxxi, 31-34. ... they shall be to me a people: and they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know Me, from the least to the greatest. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. In that He saith, A new covenant, He hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away."* No, no, Professor Max Müller, Judaism and Christianity are not two religions, but one. This is the comparative theology taught by the "sure word of prophecy," both in the Old and New Testament. As for antichristian Judaism, it is simply a parasite system which tries in vain to fasten itself to the religion of Moses and the Prophets. St. Paul's inspired pen has settled for ever that point in comparative theology. Thus the great Apostle wrote to an early Christian Church:-"Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth." This is something widely different from the comparative theology taught by some of the modern apostles in Westminster Abbey. This slip, however, would be comparatively venial, if it had not been made the basis for a very hideous superstructure, revolting to the eye of faith of believers in God's revelations of Himself. The lecturer then proceeded to enumerate the three religions which the Aryan races had produced-"the Brahman, the Buddhist, and the Parsee ; and if we add to these the Chinese systems of Confucius and Lao-tse, we have the eight distinct utterances of the faith of mankind from the beginning of the world to the present day." We think Milton spoke sober truth, in his sublime verse, when he traced the faiths of mankind, since the fall of man, to the great enemy of THE FAITH, the seducer of our first parents. But this our preacher of his comparative theology utterly ignores. We should, however, venture to ask the Professor which of the eight religions does he suppose was the primeval and dominant one. From the way in which he catalogues the "utterances of the faith of mankind,” we are at a loss to know to which he gives the palm of priority either as regards time or orthodoxy. We dare affirm that which the Dean and Chapter of Westminster Abbey would not venture to gainsay-St. Paul was as great an adept in comparative theology, and may be in comparative philology also, as the Oxford Professor. Let us see how the great Apostle to the Gentiles treats the important question under review:-"Now, as *Heb. i. 1-3; viii. 6-13. Those passages of Scripture were commented on at some length in our last number. See vol. for 1873, pp. 531-6. † Rom. x: 1-4. touching things offered unto idols, we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth. And if any man think that he knoweth any thing, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know. But if any man love God, the same is known of Him. As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God but one. For though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be gods many and lords many,) but to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by Him."* When the same Apostle describes the faith of believers, and contrasts it with the want of it in unbelievers, he traces both to their proper sources :—" Therefore, seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not; but have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but, by manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them." Who is the sober-minded Christian that would doubt that St. Paul's mode of treating the important subject is in accordance with history, experience, and true philosophy; whilst Max Müller's mode is at variance with all those. A man after St. Paul's heart, and not after that of Spinoza, should have been selected to address a Christian congregation at Westminster Abbey on "Christian Missions." We pass over the verbose account of the origin of the so-called "science of religion." We invite particular attention to the lecturer's division of the religions of the world "into missionary and nonmissionary." He is reported to have introduced this part of his address in the following terms: "Of the six religions of the Aryan and Semitic races, three have been always opposed to all missionary enterprise-Judaism, Brahminism, and Parseeism; while three have always helped forward missionary effort-Buddhism, Mohammedanism, and Christianity. The Jews have always opposed missionary enterprise; their religion is a privilege which marks them out from the rest of the world, and strangers admitted to the privileges of their theocracy are treated as aliens, not to be trusted, as their old proverb says, until the twenty-fourth generation. A similar feeling prevails among the Brahmins, and prevents them from proselytising among those who do not belong to their spiritual aristocracy, while they even go so far as to punish those of other religions who listen to their prayers or witness their sacrifices. The Parsee, too, is opposed to making converts, and though he believes in the * 1 Cor. viii. 1-6, † 2 Cor. iv. 1-4. final triumph of truth and light, and says to others, Be bright as the sun and pure as the moon,' he does little to help it forward by letting the light that is in him shine upon the world." 66 We have already demonstrated the confusion of ideas which disabled the Professor to see that primeval Judaism and Christianity were one and the same religion, and that Talmudical, or antichristian, Judaism, and Mohammedanism were excrescences, a sort of fungi, parasites which try to fasten themselves upon the only pure religion taught in the Bible. But this is only one of the lecturer's mistakes, and by no means the most serious one. He seems unaccountably ill-informed on the history of Judaism—we mean modern Judaism; for, when he talks of Judaism having been always opposed to missionary enterprise," he must mean Talmudical Judaism, as exhibited by such writers as the late Mr. Deutsch. We beg to inform the lecturer that Judaism was NOT always opposed to missionary enterprise. If he could bring himself to read the Gospels independently of his theory about his new-fangled "science of religion," he would discover that Judaism-prior to the first advent of the Redeemer-was eminently missionary. Its proselytes might have been numbered by hundreds of thousands. It may be useful to the Professor to be informed also of the cause which made antichristian Judaism distrust proselytes. The distrust arose in consequence of the great number of Gentile proselytes everywhere accepting the better, the purer, the completed Judaism, which Christ and His apostles preached. It was then that some of the Rabbis began to say all sorts of bitter things against Gentile converts, and not before. We say some of the Rabbis advisedly. We regret to have to put the Professor under obligation to us for another piece of information. Even Talmudical Judaism is intensely missionary, and would be as cruelly tenacious of its proselytes as Mohammedanism is, if it were at all dominant. The two hundred and sixty-eighth chapter of the Jewish Code of Laws, entitled Toor Yore Dayah-being a digest of certain enactments of the Talmud-is entirely devoted to the ritual of rules and regulations how to admit Gentile proselytes into the pale of the synagogue. The following enactments, laid down by Maimonides in his Hilchoth Mlacheem, will give Professor Max Müller some idea what the will of Judaism is, if it had but the power to use it, respecting proselytes:-"A son of Noah [i.e., a Gentile], who had become a proselyte, and has been circumcised and baptized, and would afterwards return from after the Lord, and be only a sojourning stranger, as he was previously, he is not to be listened to. But he must either be as an Israelite in every respect, or be put to death." Two in number are the Talmudical conditions to be proposed to a Gentile nation, with whom the Jewish nation may be at war, suing for peace: one is the submission to the seven precepts enjoined upon the sons of Noah. Failing to do so, the extermination of the whole male population of the Gentile belligerent |