reasons from with the greatest apparent earnestness, and which we can see no reason to doubt were entertained by him with perfect sincerity. In the New Testament generally, but particularly in the writings of Paul, a consideration for the moral and the spiritual everywhere prevails over that for the philosophical and the speculative. The latter is left very much where the teacher finds it, resigned to those whose business is rather philosophy than religion, and is rarely appealed to, and then only in the habitual unquestioning persuasion of the time, for the illustration and enforcement of the former. It has been unfortunate for Christianity and the peace of the Church, that the process has been generally reversed in later ages.

There are some unavoidable inconveniences attached to the influence and authority of every religion which is founded on the interpretation of ancient writings, yet the absence of such writings would be attended with far greater evils than any which may occasionally result from the misuse of them. If God has ever communicated a divine spirit to the minds of men, and given a divine impulse to the course of human affairs, the influence of that spirit and impulse can be perpetuated through future ages, and the form and character of civilization be permanently moulded by it, only through the existence of authentic monuments recording its origin and earliest operations. The idea of a Church or communion of believers and worshippers implies the existence of a doctrine and an example, which they consider to be derived from God, and consigned to the preservation of a book, which they agree to recognise as the fountain of their moral life, the source of their faith and principles. Without such a standard to appeal to, and left to the ordinary influences of reason and nature, the experience of ages may convince us, that men would find no medium between the vague and powerless speculations of philosophy, and the rude conceptions of the multitude, now sunk in the grossest fetichism, now disguised by a licentious poetry, or wrought perhaps at length by an artful priesthood into an instrument of spiritual domination. If mankind are ever destined to realise the beautiful idea of an universal brotherhood, dwelling in peace, and in the grateful acknowledgment of an universal father-there exists no means of conducting us to so happy an issue, but the gradual determination, with the progress of learning and free inquiry, of an enlightened, uniform and selfconsistent principle of interpretation, to be applied to the sacred writings, which are the source of our religious ideas, combined with the general diffusion through society of that truly fraternal spirit which the adoption of such a principle would naturally inspire. Instead therefore of complaining that the faith of mankind

has been made dependent on the interpretation of ancient and obscure books, we should recollect that this is the unavoidable condition of having any access at all to the mind of Christ without the exercise of a constant and stupendous miracle: and while we admit the errors and abuses to which this constitution of our spiritual condition has given rise, we should not forget that such errors and abuses are in themselves neither unavoidable nor invincible; and direct our attention in future, to the first means of obviating them.

We may notice three periods in the historical development of Christianity: first, during the two first centuries, when faith was nourished by preaching, fresh from the primeval fountain of apostolical earnestness and zeal, and while the Christian Scriptures, which were to form the future mind of the Church, were only gradually coming into existence: secondly, after the completion of the canon and the development of the hierarchy, when the Church became the only authorized interpreter of the Gospel; when the faith of Christendom was determined by the decrees of councils; and the multitude, shut out from all access to the Scripture, derived their notions of religion entirely from the traditions of the clergy; thirdly, after the Reformation, when the Bible in Protestant communities was submitted to the free examination of the learned, and appealed to as a final authority in matters of faith, coupled, however, with the assumption of its plenary inspiration, and the belief that an entire and self-consistent system of doctrine could be constructed out of the comparison and * combination of the whole mass of its multifarious contents. In the first of these periods, we witness the fervour and simplicity of an unlearned and popular faith, taking strong hold of men's consciences and hearts, and busying itself, but remotely and gradually, with the deeper questions of philosophy. In the second, we are made aware of the mischievous effects of an irresponsible priesthood, overwhelming with its traditions and decrees the original truths of the Gospel, and upholding throughout Christendom, an uniformity of doctrine, discipline and ritual. In the third, we notice the application of an artificial learning to the Scriptures, for the purpose of extracting from them a dogmatic system, that should embrace every question of practical wisdom and religious belief.

But new wants have made themselves felt during this third period, and new means have been devised for meeting them. With the progress of knowledge and free inquiry that has marked every century since the Reformation, an increasing difficulty has been found in reconciling all the views deduced by a fair interpretation from every part of Scripture, with the

discoveries of modern science, and with the principles of a more refined ethics and a more enlightened philosophy. Rigid orthodoxy indeed has all along maintained its original position, and given up nothing to science and philosophy, maintaining, on the assumed ground of plenary inspiration, that the truth of God must always be preferred to the speculations of men. But for the last two centuries there have been men in all parts of Protestant Europe sincerely attached to Christianity, and fully appreciating the inestimable benefits it has conferred on humanity, who plainly saw that the question could not be thus summarily disposed of who were anxious to effect an amicable adjustment between the claims of faith and reason—who desired to conciliate the natural and healthful progress of human ideas, with an undiminished reverence for those hopes and principles which Christianity had introduced into the world.

This feeling gave rise to the system of accommodation, as it has been called, according to which the inspired preachers of the Gospel were supposed to have adapted their language to the prejudices of their hearers, and to have employed, by way of figure and illustration, the popular conceptions of the time without themselves entertaining them. It must be observed, that the whole of Protestant theology has emerged out of a strong belief in the plenary inspiration of the Bible. Even the freest forms of it, as, for example, the Socinian, have been distinguished by a deep reverence even for the letter of Scripture. We might almost say, that a rigidly Scriptural Christianity is the outward mark and sign of Protestantism. What was felt or perceived to be true in morals, in philosophy, or in religion, it was assumed must be found whole and entire within the limits of the Sacred Volume. On this system, then, only one of two alternatives seemed left to the believers; either an implicit acquiescence in the literal interpretation of the words of Scripture, taken in their unforced and obvious sense, without any regard to its irreconcilableness with the conclusions of modern science and philosophy; or else the supposition, that the Sacred writers had veiled the truths they taught in language adjusted to the low and imperfect education of their contemporaries. They were said to avail themselves of Jewish modes of speech, to make impressive and intelligible their Christian doctrines. Their words, it was contended, appeared to state one thing, but the real meaning of them involved another.

Great violence was in this way frequently offered to the natural construction of the text; and it was not always perceived, that an idea was rather put into words, than fairly extracted out of them but this was the only method in which it was deemed

possible to maintain the authority of Scripture, and to uphold in any sense the notion of inspiration. A more plausible method of overcoming the difficulty was next suggested, in the distinction which it was affirmed might be drawn between that which the apostles delivered from inspiration, and that which they said under the feelings and with the knowledge of ordinary men; and in accordance with this view, the principle of interpretation approved by Paley was laid down, that we should admit the conclusions of the Apostles, and not regard their arguments. But we find, on trial, that it is not so easy to draw the line which is here suggested. Conclusions and arguments perpetually run into one another with a continuity which it is impossible, at any assignable point, to dissolve. In fact, propounded in this loose and unguarded form, the principle throws open the Bible to the license of every dogmatic interpreter. For all that accords with his own. views he will be ready to claim the sanction of divine authority. Whatever is at variance with them he will not hesitate to reject as a mere form of speech, which forms no essential part of the doctrinal system of Scripture.

It will be readily conceived, that the Epistles were that portion of the New Testament which was most severely subjected to this species of critical dissection. Their multifarious contents furnish the most abundant materials for dogmatic controversy; their practical application of Christian principles to the earliest circumstances of the Church deservedly confer on them great interest and importance; and the difference between the Apostles and Christ might seem to excuse and justify a freer treatment of their writings than would have been deemed consistent with the reverence due to the words of the Saviour himself. For this reason, the Epistles-especially the Epistles of Paul-with the Gospel of John, which possesses a similar dogmatic character, and perhaps owes its origin to similar circumstances-have ever been-and will no doubt continue to be the principal field on which the battle of a controversial theology must be fought; till the awakening of a spirit more calmly and deeply religious shall call men back to the essentials of Christianity, and dismiss polemics to the receptacle into which time finally sweeps all useless and exploded things.

No part of the New Testament is fraught with deeper interest than the Epistles of Paul,-revealing to us, as they do, the earliest development of the organic life of Christianity: there is none, as to the meaning and application of which it is perhaps more difficult to arrive at a completely satisfactory conclusion. Three courses seem open to us, and have been pursued by three different classes of inquirers :-First, That of the orthodox, who

rest in the system deduced from a literal interpretation of the Apostle's words,—and who, regarding this system as the characteristic and peculiarity of Divine Revelation, and shrouding its more difficult features in the veil of mystery, do not think it necessary to establish the conformity of their scheme with the principles of natural religion and human philosophy, or to maintain the coherence and consistency of all its elements with each other, when wrought out into their legitimate consequences. Secondly, That of those who consider Christianity as a completion and supernatural sanction of the truths of natural religion, and the resurrection of Christ in particular as a confirmation of the doctrine of a future life, of which the evidence from reason and nature is not so clear and convincing as could be wished. This is the system generally adopted by Unitarians, though not exclusively by them: those who adopt it, recognise the religion of nature as it offers itself to the reason of man, and refer to it as a standard of the truths taught in Scripture; whatever interferes with their conceptions of the teaching of reason and nature being explained into mere phraseology, and rejected from the substance of revelation. Thirdly, That of the Deist, who, admitting the correctness of many of the orthodox interpretations, but regarding as fundamental and indubitable the principles of natural religion, and being unable to reconcile the two, on the system usually embraced by Christians, concludes that Christianity itself must have had its source in imposture or fanaticism, and is nothing more than a lasting delusion.— With the first of these courses-speaking now with exclusive reference to the Epistles of Paul-we cannot concur, because some of the doctrines inculcated by orthodoxy, and which are perhaps justified by a literal interpretation of texts, would, if carried out into their consequences, appear to us not only at variance with the clearest principles of ethics and natural religion, but altogether irreconcilable with other, still greater and more vital, doctrines undoubtedly taught by the Apostle himself. As to the second, we must confess ourselves dissatisfied with several interpretations generally received among Unitarians, because they seem to us to put a meaning into the Apostle's words which they do not naturally bear, or perhaps more frequently do not admit the entire force which is fairly deducible from those words, often resolving into a form of speech, or a Jewish illustration, what we cannot but regard as the expression of deep and living conviction. With the Deist we cannot agree, because there is to our minds strong evidence of a divine power -a superhuman influence and operation-in the life and teachings of Christ, for which we can find no adequate cause in the