exercised by Jews against the infant Church; the sanguinary feuds among themselves, which darkened the last days of their retention of Jerusalem; the covetousness, extortions, hypocrisy, which have disgraced their name in all lands; their reception of numberless false Messiahs, as, for instance, Barchochěbas in the second, and Sabbathai Sevi in the seventeenth century; these are facts which must not be overlooked, for assuredly their record is on high. But as little should we wish to blot out the remembrance of what the Jews have been, or the hope of what they may be. They have been the appointed channel of God's mercy to mankind at large: the recipients of His oracles; His adopted sons, bound to Him by special covenant; subjects of His law; a light amid the darkness of Heathendom; maintainers of the true worship; heirs of the promises; the children of the Patriarchs, the kinsmen of the Prophets, the fathers of the Apostles and first Martyrs; the brethren, according to the flesh, of the One true and perfect Man, who is the Saviour of the world, Christ Jesus the Lord, from heaven, the Eternal Son, the Second Person of the ever-blessed and undivided Trinity. They may be, ere the world's last sun has set, the most devoted of all the worshippers of Christ. Both aspects are patent upon the face of Holy Scripture. Prophets alternately bless and denounce: Jerusalem is as Sodom, and yet the holy City;' the Redeemer Himself weeps over it, and concludes with a tender lament, the most tremendous outburst of righteous indignation, which He, the meek and merciful, was ever known to utter upon earth. S. Paul, in continual sorrow for his brethren, praying that they might be saved, recounting all their glories in the past, wishing himself anathema for their sakes, is yet compelled to turn from them to the Gentile world,' and to leave it on record that in his day 'they please not God and are contrary to all men: forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up 'their sins alway: for the wrath is come upon them to the utter'most." And yet it is this same Apostle who promises that, for all this, they may be-nay surely shall be-again in the latter days, believing, repentant, pardoned, and accepted of God. It is the recognition of this duplex character of Judaism which gives life and meaning to that affecting poem in the Christian Year, from which we have already borrowed: it is this which lends force to that fine comparison of the earthly Israel to the "Edipus Coloneus' of Sophocles, which many will remember in the pages of the Lyra Apostolica: 1 S. Matt. xxiii. 2 Romans ix. 2, x. 1. ix. 4, 5, 3. 3 Acts xiii. 46. xviii. 6. xxviii. 28. We have said that even mistaken notions, as we deem them, may have been mixed with truth, and converted to good ends. But it does not thence follow that any systematic misinterpretation of God's Word can be otherwise than a great and serious evil. If, among the expectants of a temporal restoration of Israel and return to Canaan, there are some who are sober and cautious students of Holy Writ, with the majority the idea but too often includes there most wild and unworthy notions, interpretations of Scripture quite derogatory to the dignity of God's Word, which is thereby connected with events of the most trivial, circumscribed, and ephemeral nature. But too often do the supporters of such views betray the presence of a Judaic element in their creed, which is one of the most marked and painful characteristics of their entire school of theology.' But too often does there appear to be a lack of appreciation of the wonderful blessings which (despite all the miserable infirmities and short-comings of individuals and communities) Christianity has wrought for mankind; the evil state of classic Paganism, Buddhism, and Bramanism is disregarded, and the greatness and glory of Christ's Church remains unrecognised. But to dwell upon the Church's greatness leads, it will be urged, to placing the Church in the first place in men's hearts, and its Divine founder in the second. Doubtless such an error may exist, and it is a sad and miserable one. But so may similar ills arise from the proclamation of any Divine truth. Reverence for God's Word-homage and love to the Only-begotten Sonwhat verities can be more sacred? Yet teaching the one has been known to lead to a most injurious Bibliolatry; to a regard for the letter, and a loss of its spirit: and gratitude to the Saviour has been at times permitted to engender the pernicious heresy, which would regard the Second Person of the Holy Trinity as mild and merciful, and the First Person as only 1 See Mr. Samuel Lucas's able Essay on 'History as a condition of Progress.— (Murray.) We might quote too the Edinburgh reviewer on Church Parties; but we mislike such allies;-Danaos et dona ferentes. wrathful and severe-as if there could be a divided will in the Unity of the Divine Majesty. Shall we, therefore, cease to make known these solemn truths? My yévoiro. In sooth, there is hardly any idea intellectually more feeble, or morally and religiously more mischievous, than that which would represent a thorough and hearty belief in one article of the Creed as incompatible with sound acceptance of another. It is the very groundwork of all heresy and misbelief. Do not honour the Son, said the Arian; you detract from the glory of the Father. Do not preach a Trinity, says the Mahometan; you interfere with the sublime truth of the Unity, &c., &c., &c. There is no end to objections of this kind. Yet few can be more utterly unscriptural than the charge of dishonour being done to the Lord of lords, by a proclamation of the claims of His Bride, the Church of God. It is in the Psalms, the Prayer-book of Christians for all time, that we are told not only of the true David, but likewise of the true Jerusalem. It is the Evangelic Prophet (Evangelista potiùs quàm propheta, as he has been truly termed) who foretells the Man of sorrows, yet also expatiates on the splendours of that kingdom which even upon earth is full of the divinest grandeur, though its glories be invisible to carnal eyes, its melodies unheard of unpurged ears. It is the Apostle born out of due time, to whom Jesus appeared on the road to Damascus, who speaks not only of Him who was long-suffering, but likewise of that spiritual union betwixt Christ and His Church, which was symbolised by the matrimony of our first parents, while yet in Paradise. It is the loved disciple which leaned on His breast at supper,' who was cheered in his lonely exile not only by the sight of the glorified Son of man,' but also by the vision of the New Jerusalem, the Lamb's Wife, the Bride adorned for her husband. Oh! if many of those whom we love and honour, and would fain imitate in goodness, would but lay these things to heart, they would surely drop the notion of earthly, local, territorial, theories, and look rather for the fulfilment of prophecy in Christ's Church, as she is, and far more as she shall one day be. But at least we have here one ground of union. The Churches at large, despite their terrible and mournful schisms, can join with heartfelt hope in one prayer, beyond those based upon the Creeds which are the common heritage of Christendom. We may all sue for mercy on God's ancient people, and pray that God would fetch them home to His flock, that they may be saved among the remnant of the true Israelites, and be made one fold under one Shepherd, Jesus Christ, our Lord.' Ita fiat, O Domine! fiat voluntas tua! 171 ART. V.-Voltaire and his Times. By L. F. BUNGENER. Authorized translation. Edinburgh: Thomas Constable & Co. 1854. CUSTOM, fashion, and the habits of an age, are at all times interesting and curious subjects of inquiry. Mankind are swayed to and fro, by mysterious unseen influences, to approve at one time what at another they most condemn; to run mad after a fancy of the moment, which is afterwards forgotten or despised. Popular delusions are a study of themselves, and have their history wherewith to accuse the human race of never-ending waves of folly. The delusion of table-turning has within a few weeks been thought worthy of public refutation on scientific principles, as part of a distinguished course of lectures delivered at the Royal Institution, before royalty itself. But fashion has its sway unchecked in very many departments of human life; and can defy all science, all discretion, and even all religion. Where it effects those things only that are legitimate objects of variety, it is useful and refreshing. Much ennui is avoided in a large class of our fellow-subjects by the difference of angle subtended in the position of a bonnet. The eye is quickened, and the mind kept alive, by many of the innocent novelties that succeed each other in the stream of life. The great ocean itself is not stagnant, but presents an ever-changing face an example followed by all Nature, if studied with an observant eye. The objects, however, effected by this power of fashion are not always such as admit of variety without serious consequences to the deepest interest of our being. The consideration of this fickle influence assumes a very different aspect when we see that a blind obedience to her has led a whole generation into the denial of all religion, and to professed infidelity. In France, during the eighteenth century, it was the fashion to be an infidel; it was the mark of an inquiring mind, the symbol of intelligence. A strong religious conviction, such as at all times is a rare quality, was then necessary in order to avoid what now seems the extremity of wickedness, and almost insanity. Men in these days, who take their ideas from the habits of the ageand are, in accordance with them, induced to present a respectable exterior, and even talk of religion with some degree of solemnity and approval-would, very many of them, have been professed infidels, if their lot had been cast in France of the last century, and they had possessed no greater earnestness than now serves their purpose, and allows them to remain respect able. We are not indeed to suppose that the mass of a nation are really no better for a general respect to religion, and for Christianity being, as it were, the fashion. We are bound, of course, to see the greatest advantage in the prevalence of truth over error; but very little discernment of human motives is necessary to convince our plain understanding, that in comparing the religion of one age with another, we must take into calculation on the one side a large number of individuals whose profession of the Christian faith is materially influenced by fashion, and who, under other circumstances, would hold very different language. The book now before us is an irregular and informal history of this period of infidelity in France; and of all the works of its author which we have read, it is the most interesting and the most full of genuine information and anecdote. True and useful sentiments are also interspersed here and there, which show considerable thought and clearness of mind in the analysis both of individual motives and of general political principles. The style of M. Bungener is always somewhat rambling, and his progress is often through mazes and jungles, in which the reader needs quick attention if he would not be lost; but with patience, either on the one hand to follow the argument, or on the other to endure a temporary cessation of interest, he is always rewarded before long by some interesting touches of sentiment or description, some facts or pictures. Voltaire is made the centre and spirit of this infidel school. Its gradual approach is described, its influences on social life, on the drama, on art, and on politics, are traced; the want of truthfulness and morality encouraged by it is exposed, and the hypocrisy of some of its main professions successfully laid open. The history of this period has been often written, but M. Bungener very truly observes that a useful history of such times, and of such men, should be written with reference to their bearing on the existing state of society. M. Villemain's history he considers now obsolete. 'More than one friend has asked me, sometimes in serious alarm about me, sometimes perhaps with an approach to a sneer, whether then I proposed to retouch Villemain. My answer, then, as it is now, was that M. Villemain has had few more constant or sincere admirers than I; but would he himself, I added, had he the same things to treat now, treat them as he did then? Twenty years have almost doubled the distance that parted us from the last century, when he finished his review of it. Twenty years, it is more than Tacitus called grande mortalis ævi spatium. Twenty years, it is much at any epoch, and, in our days, seems almost an age.'Voltaire and his Times, pp. iii. iv. This now antique line is thus described: |