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the voice of any living teacher save One, to the corrective supplied in this Address to the minute criticism of Scripture. We are not deprecating careful study of words and phrases the jots and the tittles of the Law and of the Gospel; but we do protest against a microscopic study of details, in which the grand view of the whole Christian verity is entirely put out of sight. We have the separate and, in some cases, fragmentary portions of Scripture so incessantly brought before us, and such an outcry is sometimes raised against the modulation of our utterances on separate texts, so as to accord with the harmony of the whole faith, that we sometimes fear lest the very existence of systematic theology should be scouted as one of the "legal fictions of the orthodox." The sound of the following sentences is truly full of promise, as they fall from the lips of a Theological Tutor in these days, when "there are manifest tokens that, having rent the mantles of the prophets," the unbelievers are gathering round the Form most sacred to us all; and are prepared to cast lots upon the seamless vesture of His truth, whose it shall be." "However true it may be," says the new Tutor, "that we best receive our knowledge of Divine things fresh and living from the pens and lips of the inspired writers, it has ever been found essential, in the training of theological students, that they should have in their minds, as early as possible, an outline of the majestic system of divinity that the evangelical church has, from its beginning, found in the Bible; a system which was completed in all its elements when the last writer of the New Testament laid down his pen; and which, as our most holy faith,' it is the

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office of the church to defend from addition and corruption." Many beautiful glimpses of the fruitful fields of Christian truth are opened up by various expressions in this Address; and no one can read them without coveting an opportunity of overhearing the writer discoursing in his lecture-room of the things of God.

We trust that Mr. Pope will remember, that while his immediate hearers are his first care, and will be the earliest to acknowledge his efforts, there is a wider audience awaiting him in the regions of Methodism beyond the peaceful enclosures of Didsbury, to whom his voice is very pleasant, and who would highly appreciate, in their varied spheres of toil and business, his views on those forms of intellectual opposition to the truth that they meet with, not in the treatises of the learned, but in the lives and hearts of the multitude. Theological students are to be envied, if they can sit at the feet of one who has in view for them and for himself such ends as this Address unfolds, and who commends them to notice with that chaste and elegant diction in which it abounds.

Memorials of the Rev. William J. Shrewsbury. By his Son, John V. B. Shrewsbury. London: Hamilton, Adams, and Co.-The devoted minister whose career is here traced lives in the esteem of many, both as an eminently holy and faithful servant of the Lord Jesus, and as a thoughtful and searching expositor of the sacred Scriptures. For many years he was engaged in missionary service; and in the earlier part of his career endured severe persecution from those who sought to uphold the system of Negro slavery in our West-Indian colonies. The narrative of his

labours in these colonies, and of his subsequent mission to South Africa, is full of interest. Indeed, the whole biography has many charms, although some passages might have been modified with advantage. The fidelity and purity which Mr. Shrewsbury habitually sought to maintain; the assiduity and perseverance with which he applied himself to mental culture, that he might more efficiently do the work of Christ; the zeal and earnestness with which he engaged in his pastoral duties; and the meek submission with which he bowed to the afflictive dispensations of Divine Providence; are worthy of especial admiration, and should lead us to glorify God in him. We hope that this tribute of filial reverence and love to the memory of one whose great but modest worth was only partially known and appreciated during his life, will be extensively useful.

"Peace unto the Heathen," and other Sermons, preached on behalf of the Church Missionary Society. By the Rev. John Harding, Curate of Ayet St. Lawrence, and late Missionary at Travancore. London: Macintosh.-These sermons have in them much evangelical and missionary fervour. There is no attempt at originality or ornateness, and the phraseology is simple and largely scriptural. The author, in his dedication, speaks of the volume as a "first fruit." Perhaps this may explain some carelessness of expression; as, when he speaks of the "felicitous, glorious reign" of Christ; and again, strangely, of His "meritorious imputed righteousness." Further, when he says in the preface, that "he often marvels at the few men in our universities who offer themselves for missionary work," we presume that he is astonished at the smallness of

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their number, and not at the men themselves; but the language literally means the contrary. He reports that the Church Missionary Society has gathered one hundred and twenty thousand “converts,” but only twenty-two thousand of them are "communicants." We question the propriety of calling the nominal professors on the Stations "converts; as also the correctness of another assertion, which is, that the Church of England supplies one-fourth of the amount raised for Protestant Missions throughout the world. We fear the part taken by the wealthiest Church in Christendom in this great enterprise bears a much smaller proportion than this. However, we wish this book may answer the author's pious hope, by increasing the funds and agencies of the Society he rejoices to serve.

Chronological Synopsis of the Four Gospels. By H. Grenville. London: John R. Smith.-Our "Harmonists," from Bengel to the present time, have done great service in promoting the critical study of the New Testament, though it is too much to expect that they will remove all the difficulties that arise from the apparent chronological discrepancies of the Evangelists. It is tolerably evident that each Evangelist wrote on a plan of his own; and in the absence of authoritative information as to what that plan was according to his own idea of it, there will remain occasion for diversity of opinion on a variety of points; but the true inspiration of the record is unaffected by this want of absolute agreement. Sufficient has been done to satisfy us of the substantial harmony of the fourfold history; and if the most approved critics fail to see every point of chronology alike,

it only furnishes additional evidence of the freedom with which each evangelist as, in the highest degree, a reliable historian wrote his account. It was perfectly natural that John should supplement his predecessors. Mr. Grenville here presents to us the results of lengthened and pains-taking study. We should conclude that he has well weighed the statements of both friendly and antagonist critics; and he has brought his findings within a definite and appreciable compass. It is not to be supposed that all his adjust ments will be universally received. His views on the composition of the "Sermon on the Mount" will not be accepted by those who think that Matthew has given us the report of a connected address. The notes contain, in a condensed form, a large amount of critical material of very considerable value, though occasionally his reasons may not be convincing. We do not agree with him in his representation, either of the time of the year, or of the time of the day, when our Saviour held His converse with the Samaritan woman. His note relative to the day on which the Saviour celebrated His last Passover, and that on which the crucifixion occurred, is worthy of a careful study. The student of the evangelists will find much to interest him in the fifty pages of which Mr. Grenville's Synopsis consists.

Short Arguments about the Millennium. By the Rev. B. C. Young.

London: Elliot Stock. Pp. 256. Second Thousand.-This is the second edition of a small, but very useful and reliable book, which has already received favourable notice in this Magazine. As the pre-millenarian theory has obtained, by the bold plainness,

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or by the insinuating eloquence, of its advocates, a wide currency among the less learned circles of the religious world, a plain, unvarnished, yet calm and scriptural refutation of it was desired. The want is largely met in this publication. In this edition, additional chapters are furnished on "the Rapture Theory," and on Prophecy and the Present Time." In the latter is shown how remarkably several lines of prophetic intimation concentrate upon our own days-as the period when Antichrist and the False Prophet are to be fatally stricken, if not destroyed; yet the author guards against the assumption that this crisis must of necessity be "the end of all things." The treatise also keeps constantly before the reader the practical bearing of the controversy with the millenarian. If the world is not to be converted by the Word and Spirit of God under this dispensation, but by a personal appearance of the Lord, the church is under a serious misapprehension. If Jesus Christ is not yet upon the throne of David, exalted until His enemies become His footstool, and if He has not the power by which all nations shall be subdued, then faith and preaching are vain. So that this is not a dispute merely about "times and seasons," and

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or send the Gospel to every creature? We need not say that these views are chiefly held among those who do not believe in the general redemption of mankind. While accepting the broad principles of interpretation observed in this little work, we are not to be regarded as approving every exposition here presented to us. We are not certain, for instance, that in Matt. xxiv. there is no reference to the end of time, as well as to the end of the Jewish economy. A few exceptionable views, however, do not prevent our most cordial recommendation of the book for its comprehensive, sober, and condensed refutation of the errors it encounters.

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complishment in the Period of the Millennium.` By John Mills, Minister of the Gospel, Author of Sacred Symbology" and "Thoughts on the Apocalypse." London: Elliot Stock.-The writer of this book of three hundred and forty pages elaborates the theory that the scriptural "promise" of "new heavens, and a new earth," is fulfilled in the establishment of Christianity upon a displaced Judaism, and in the effective and universal regeneration of mankind to be accomplished by its influ ence. In this way he thinks that he refutes those who imagine that our globe, physically renewed, will be the inheritance of the saints; and also those who imagine that mankind are only to be converted by the personal coming of our Lord. In order to this it would be necessary to show that Isaiah (chap. lxv.)and Peter(Second Epistle, chap. iii.) meant by new heavens and a new earth" only the coming and pervasive power of a new dispensation of grace. But in this he fails, being compelled in p. 108 to admit that St. Peter evidently refers to the heavenly state, as well as to the millennial glory. So that his reasoning, while it may present some face to the millenarian, is discomfited before those who expect this globe to be the scene of the future heaven. We wonder that one SO favourably disposed to the argu ment of analogy as this author, should not be willing to admit that both the prophet and the apostle look forward to the final consummation; but the prophet employs this grand expectation to symbolize the spiritual transformations of Messiah's reign. The New Creation: a View of the Does not St. Paul's expression, (2 Divine Predictions of New Heavens Cor. v. 17,) "a new creation," and a New Earth, as having a Pro-Krious, involve a similar allusion? gressive Fulfilment in the Christian The disappearance of the Jewish Dispensation, and a complete Ac- system was the passing away of

Memorials of Charles March, Commander, R.N. By his Nephew, Septimus March, B.A. James Nisbet and Co. 1867.-This is a volume of two hundred and thirtysix pages, intended to commemorate one of those Christian heroes, who, from time to time, have adorned the annals of the British navy, and who by their bright examples have proved the possibility of serving God while serving their country on the ocean. The volume is very well got up; and the memoir, which is agreeably written, does credit to the author, who is, we believe, a respected Independent Minister at Southampton. A striking portrait of Captain March is prefixed to the volume, which will form a suitable companion to that which contains the memoir of Hedley Vicars.

the old heavens; the obscuring of a former light, and the gradual extension of Christianity may be viewed as the creation of a new earth: but this does not exhaust the words of St. Peter, as the titlepage of this book would indicate; and therefore is not opposed to the opinion of those who conjecture that this globe, purified and sublimated by the last fire, may be our future heaven. Of the independent probability of this theory we say nothing at present. Incidentally, the book supplies some antidote to millenarian notions; but it is vitiated by the fallacy just named: and the unhappy verbiage in which the author delights,-five hundred words being generally used where fifty would express a clearer and more forcible meaning, with the frequent repetition of certain phrases, will confine most readers to his first pages. A great part of the book is occupied with the idea that the "new creation" of the moral world is conducted in exact harmony with the progress of the material creation; and that acquaintance with geological and astronomical science will help us to understand the spiritual progress of mankind. He thinks that the slow deposition of the superficial strata upon mountain masses of primary rock, the advancing developments in the

forms of life, and the transitions from periods of terrible desolation to those of comparative quietness and enjoyment which geological phenomena exhibit, are all a kind of "unconscious prophecy" of the moral processes by which the 66 new earth "shall be produced. Perhaps some general illustration of the Divine procedure in the spiritual world may be drawn from the wonderful discoveries supplied by the long hidden archives of the rocks, as we have learned from such works as Dr. Harris's "Pre-Adamite Earth;" but our author pursues the matter into details which savour of the

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correspondences" of Swedenborg. Among the ignes fatui which flicker over the border bogs of science and theology, none are more delusive than the suppositions of analogy and symbolism. The correlative principles of nature and revelation need patient study, and future investigation may show us many instructive resemblances in the different sections of the work of God; but scientific accuracy and philosophic clearness will be needed to make the evidence forcible. The only authorities in geology quoted by Mr. Mills are M'Causland and Hitchcock; while the faults of style much lessen the value of some propositions with which we cordially agree.

GLANCE AT PUBLIC OCCURRENCES.

If the French Emperor ever seriously hoped to realize his project of an European Conference on the Roman Question, he must have abandoned the expectation when he permitted his two Ministers, the Marquis de Moustier and M. Rouher, to make declarations in the French Chambers, to the

effect that Italy should not be allowed, under any circumstances, to possess itself of Rome. As that is the very point in dispute, there is nothing left of sufficient moment to submit to a Congress of European diplomatists. At present, then, the Papacy is protected by the military power of France,

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