almost insupportable. Whilst kneeling in the distant and solitary chamber, in front of the bed upon which the corpse of the deceased was laid, he became greatly agitated. He could not endure the thought that the good-the beloved-had actually ceased to be. Could it indeed be possible that she was passed away into an eternal oblivion, into nothingness? 66 If there be a God, surely he will deliver me from this dreadful anguish of soul. Such was his thought his hope. His prayer was a sigh. Ens entium miserere mei!-In this moment of extreme perturbation, his whole frame trembling violently, and his eyes filled with tears, the corpse suddenly appeared to him to raise itself into a sitting posture, and immediately again sink back. The recollection of a similar apparition mentioned in the little book the deceased had pointed out to him, instantly flashed across his mind. From that moment, and ever afterwards, my father's belief that his wife had designed to give him, through the medium of her corpse, a sign of her continued consciousness, was as confident as his belief that the corpse had appeared to him to raise itself up. Thus in a thousand instances does belief mingle itself with fact. The presumed explanation of the cause, and the actual occurrence, become interwoven with each other, and constitute history. Firm however as my father's conviction was of the reality of the apparition, he has more than once assured me that whilst still kneeling by the bed, he sought to discover whether what he had seen might not have been a delusion, the effect of refraction, his eyes being at the time filled with tears. But he tried in vain to reproduce the same appearance." Thus by one single flash and stroke, were my father's metaphysical doubts as it were physically annihilated. That which he believed to have actually happened, and which consequently he could not but regard and hold fast as a fact, together with his own persuasion respecting the cause and design of the occurrence, became so indissolubly connected in his mind, that it ever remained a matter of absolute certainty with him that he had received a sensible demonstration, not only of the continued existence and consciousness of the departed—but also that the deceased retain a recollection of the events of their former life. Now indeed the existence of the Deity—of that Being who had shown mercy to the supplicant, and had vouchsafed an answer to his prayer, could no longer be subject of doubt. The premises, upon which to build that system of theology which had always appeared to him consistent in itself, were now abundantly proved." "The recurrence of such apparitions to a mind which had once fully admitted their reality, is no-wise surprising. They became increasingly frequent, and in his latter years, visions and significant dreams were almost matters of course: they were the rule rather than the exception.” We have Dr. Paulus's assurance that after the intimate intercourse of many years it was impossible for him ever to entertain the slightest doubt of the perfect sincerity of his father's belief in the reality of all these supernatural apparitions and impressions. On the contrary, his earnest devotion, his honest ad herence to his persuasions, the rightness of his intentions, his active zeal, and his persevering, untiring industry, made a deep and lasting impression upon the youthful mind of his son, and inspired him with the truest respect and esteem for his father's character. The father's religious instructions to his children were conveyed chiefly through the medium of books and discourses. In these readings, however, many things were occasionally advanced which the boy felt to be assertion without proof, and which it was impossible for him to affirm that he believed. "He earnestly desired to believe, and it was cause of great unhappiness to him that he could not force himself to admit all that was so confidently asserted. He realized the experience that he whose mind has once been awakened to reflection, cannot believe because he may desire to believe that it is not in the power of any man-however great his anxiety may be to receive one particular view-to compel himself to regard as true, what appears to him either inconsistent in itself, or in contradiction to ascertained and established truths. The boy neither had, nor could have, any distinctly apprehended grounds of doubt, much less did he seek to disbelieve. Most willingly would he have embraced that which he was taught, could it only have been made to appear credible to him. Yet it was impossible for him to attribute to God-to that Being to whom he ascribed all his young mind could conceive of highest and best—those many arbitrary decrees and acts which are so unhesitatingly imputed to the All-good. Moreover, the adduced passages from the Bible did not seem to him always to express that which appeared to him so unworthy of the Divine Being. He heard with how much confidence these interpretations and inferences were maintained; still conviction, such as he experienced respecting many other matters, was not produced in his mind. To persuade himself that he did believe, was to contradict his inward consciousness; yet how often did he endeavour, with childlike simplicity, to compel belief." He could not venture to confess his doubts and fears to his father, who would not fail to regard his unbelief as disbelief, and to class him among the reprobates who are unworthy of the divine mercy. He continued silent, but became more and more unhappy. His anxiety to know and embrace that which was true, continually increased; and it became with him a fixed and sacred resolve, to make the attainment of individual conviction the primary object of his life. It was this irresistible necessity to satisfy his own mind, which at ten years of age determined him to become a theologian. This choice was by no means disagreeable to his father, but he was apprehensive lest the displeasure of the ecclesiastical authorities which had fallen upon himself, in consequence of his visionary persuasions, might be extended to his son, and retard his advancement. These fears proved wholly groundless, but no anticipation of future difficulties would have had any weight in Paulus's mind against the ardent desire he had formed. His resolution was taken, and he pursued the needful preparatory course of study both at the academy and at the university, with a never-failing ardour, and persevering assiduity; the encouragement he met with from his instructors inspiring him continually with fresh energy. At the age of fourteen the paternal roof and his father's tuition were exchanged for the Kloster-school at Blaubeuren. Here he remained for two years, when he was removed to the upperschool at Bebenhausen, preparatory to his matriculation at the University of Tubingen. Paulus's entrance at a public school was also his initiation into the world. He here first acquired a knowledge of real life. Among his many new experiences, nothing seems to have excited more surprise and disapprobation, than to find a spirit of rivalry and emulation encouraged, and made the stimulus to exertion. He had previously no conception of an ambition growing out of envy. Taught by his father that a thing was to be done because it was in itself desirable or right, he knew no other impulse to exertion than the desire to possess that inward satisfaction which ever rewards our best efforts. We cannot follow him step by step through his academical career. This portion of the memoir contains much that is valuable respecting the course of study best calculated to prepare the mind of the student for theological investigation. He speaks of Professor Ploucquet's lectures on theoretical philosophy with particular approbation and gratitude. It was the method invariably adopted by that professor, of distinguishing between that which is in its own nature necessarily true, and that which can be considered only as more or less probable, which served to strengthen and confirm the previous direction of Paulus's mind, and it became with him an habitual aim in all his studies, in every branch of inquiry, to obtain inward conviction of the true, independent of all dogmatical and theoretical opinions and speculations. Dr. Paulus distinguished himself at the University, but his health suffered from his intense application. His next years were spent in travelling. For this advantage he was indebted to the liberality of Freiherr von Palm, who was in the habit of devoting yearly a considerable sum to literary and scientific objects. Paulus had been favourably spoken of to this gentleman, and he most unexpectedly received from him a remittance which enabled him to visit many of the German Universities, and to extend his travels to England. At Oxford he devoted himself to the study and transcription of some of the Oriental Manuscripts which he found in the Bodleian Library. This service probably led to his appointment, shortly after, in the year 1789, to the Professorship of Oriental Languages at Jena. In 1794 he was made Professor of Theology, but in 1804 he was removed from Jena to Würzburg on account of his health. In 1811 he was called to fill the vacant chair, as Professor of Theology and of Philosophy at Heidelberg. He was also constituted Privy-Counsellor of the Ecclesiastical Court of Baden. Dr. Paulus was now to be the teacher of others, and most ably and conscientiously did he fulfil his mission. To trace the natural harmony between the Bible and human reason-to separate the essentially true and permanent in Christianity, from the opinions and notions incident to the age in which they took their rise to distinguish between the religion of Jesus, and the dogmas of the fathers and scholastics, and to assign to the latter their proper value-these were the objects he proposed to himself in his public lectures. But we will quote his own words on the duty and importance of religious inquiry, on the love of truth, and the adequate capabilities of the human mind for the attainment of truth. "To submit each individual point of belief to a severe scrutiny-to search out the agreement of each separate position with all other recognized truths-to ascertain that the probable is in complete and rational harmony with the true-is a duty as imperative in religion as in every other branch of inquiry. This is the highest duty of the right thinking and rightly disposed mind; and its prosecution in regard to religion is rendered less difficult because, in matters of religious conviction, we are protected against superstition on the one hand, and disbelief on the other, by two considerations; viz., whether that which is asserted to be true accords, in the first place, with the notions we form of the divine perfections, and, secondly, with the knowledge man has of himself—of his own nature. But a love of ease must not lead us to admit those decisions, those theological and dogmatical opinions, which have been handed down to us, as if they were infallible, whilst we never permit the investigation of the true, in any other department of science, to be suspended. In availing ourselves of that which has been transmitted both in religion and in theology, we must neither suffer ourselves to be seduced into stationary acquiescence, nor allow the want of infallibility to drive us to despondency: we must guard ourselves equally against the believing nothing, and the believing every thing." * * * * * And what is the purest love of truth? Is it not the unfettered striving of the mind to attain to a right conviction respecting all that is— in small things, as well as in great? What do we mean by absolute certainty? In what does it consist but in this; that the opinion which we conceive to be true is found to be substantiated by every argument which presents itself to the mind, and can likewise be brought into unconstrained harmony with those truths of which we are already convinced?” But a consciousness of absolute certainty is attained to, then only, when the individual mind, dismissing all its individual accidents, its peculiarities, passions and inclinations, exerts those powers of apprehension and of judgment, which it possesses in common with all others of the race, who likewise, releasing themselves as far as possible from disturbing and distorting individualities, strive to think and judge correctly. We cannot apprehend an object in its actual purity-such as it really is. All knowledge is subjective, is to be attained only through the medium of the conceptive and reflective powers. That which is essential, therefore, is, that we separate our own accidental individualities (the peculiarities of the individual mind) from those faculties which we, as human beings, possess in common with all men. Let but these faculties, which are common to all, be exercised and applied wholly unfettered and unbiassed by individual peculiarities, and with regard to their universal validity for all who, as members of the human race, are able and willing to reflect, no ground of doubt will remain. However willingly we would persuade ourselves that we arrive at something beyond mere human certainty, by soaring into the region of the ideal-by aspiring after the superhumanabsolute-the fact is, we obtain conviction by a constant careful investigating belief on ourselves—on our own powers, in as far as we are able, both in thinking and determining, to raise ourselves above that which is individual, to that which is subjective—to that which is universally, generically subjective. And in such manner only can we exercise the human capabilities, in their fullest application, to the attainment of a more perfect measure of truth. To the inquirer after truth, nothing is more requisite than that he should frequently realize this only possible mode of becoming humanly certain of the true, and that he should judge of its applicability to widely different objects according to their diversity. This is why we find the acutest thinkers have ever been so much occupied with the methodus inveniendi verum." Dr. Paulus gives a long account of his mode of studying and interpreting the writings of the Apostles of the manner in which he was gradually led to reject the commonly-received notions, and particularly the orthodox doctrine of " Justification by Faith." He writes "I clearly perceived that in the writings of the Apostle, and in them alone, were to be sought the Apostolic principles of distinction between blind faith in dogmas, and that faithfulness to conviction-to the belief of the mind, which is saving faith; and which is possible alike to all men; and which, according to Paul, is as pleasing to God in Abraham, as it is in the Christian, who, since the teaching of Jesus, possesses so |