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Never has there been a time in which it has been so important for the Christian, and especially the Christian minister, to be thoroughly familiar with this great argument.

Christ and other Masters. By CHARLES HARDWICKE, A.M. Macmillan. Mr. Hardwicke is very creditably known as the author of a volume intitled A History of the Christian Church during the Middle Ages-one in the series of theological manuals now in course of publication in Cambridge. In the present work, Mr. Hardwicke leaves the speculations of the past, for the most part, and deals with the religious thinking of our own time. It is befitting the scholar who has accepted the office of Christian Advocate in his own University that he should concern himself with such topics.

This volume consists of three parts-the first is on the Religious Tendencies of the Present Age; the second is on the Unity of the Race and the third treats of the Characteristics of the Religion of the Old Testament. These are all important subjects, but they are all preliminary, and form the first part only of the subject contemplated by the author. We almost regret that this first part has been published before its sequel, for that sequel, if worked out deliberately and thoroughly, will meet a deeply felt want in the religious thought of our time.

It has become very common of late years to regard the heathen mind of the East and West as possessing a revelation, without an inspired book, quite as truly as the Hebrew mind possessed it by means of such a book. The tendency, too, has been to exaggerate the good to be found in the old heathenism, and to detract from the good found in the Hebrew records, so as to narrow the distance between the Gentile and the Jew as much as possible, and to present the Father of the universe as dealing more equally with his creatures than many Christians have been disposed to think. That the alleged narrowness of the Jew in this respect has descended in some degree to the Christian may be admitted. But the plausible theory on the other side is in danger of being pushed too far. Mr. Maurice's Lectures on the Religions of the World partake of this excess, and the same may be said of the similar course of thought in the writings of Mr. Trench. Mr. Hardwicke, while disposed to speak in the most friendly terms of everything proceeding from the pen of Mr. Maurice, expresses regret that he has not treated of this alleged parallelism between Christianity and other religious systems historically, rather than to so great an extent hypothetically. As it is,' says our author, he rather helps us to philosophise on what may possibly have 'been the attributes of those religions, as viewed by the more elevated 'minds of heathendom, than to determine the precise complexion ' of the popular belief, and its true relations to the doctrines of the 'gospel. I feel, moreover, that the growth and perseverance of 'such systems are always traceable quite as much to their accordance with the lower and depraved tastes of humanity as to their supernatural influences exerted on their constitution by the ever 'present Logos, or to the fragments of primeval truth they are

supposed to have retained.'-Preface. Mr. Hardwicke's purpose accordingly seems to be, to furnish the needed supplement to Mr. Maurice's speculations on this subject. In this first part of the intended treatise we have an able analysis of modern thought in regard to religion, as observable in this country, on the continent, and in America; a fair summary view of the argument for the unity of the race, showing the probable origin of the religious systems of antiquity; and an exposition of the religious element in the Old Testament, showing it to have been the same element which has been more fully developed in the New Testament. This done, Mr. Hardwicke proceeds, in conclusion, to say :

'If it be found hereafter, on a strict examination of their sacred books and other ancient documents, that nearly all the heathen systems were defective in those very points which form the leading characteristics of revealed religion; if the general tendency of pagan thought was in philosophers to pantheism, or the worship of nature as a whole, and in the many to polytheism, or the deification of the particular energies of nature; if sin was there regarded as eternal and as necessary, or in other cases as unreal, notwithstanding those frequent reclamations of the moral consciousness which drove men to devise new rites of worship, and to rear new altars in honour of the 'unknown' divinity; if being thus without God in the world,' the heathen were also without hope,' the victims in their thoughtful moments of distracting doubt, of abject terror, and of withering desperation, we may thence derive not only a fresh stock of motives for disseminating truths that we profess, but special reasons for abstaining from all heathenish speculations, and for listening with a more docile spirit to the 'oracles of God.''-p. 151.

Yes, if these points may all be taken out of the region of imagination and fancy, and settled as matters of history, and Mr. Hardwicke bids us think that this may be done, the effect must be to discourage certain heathenish speculations' which have found too much favour of late, even with some good men, and to prepare us for attaching a higher value to the oracles of God.' The religious systems to be analysed for this purpose are those of Hindostan and the adjoining countries; those of Mexico, China, and the South Seas; those of Persia and Egypt, Greece and Rome; and those of the Saxon, Scandinavian, and Slavonic tribes. We congratulate Mr. Hardwicke on the subject thus sketched for investigation. It is one of deep interest, and possessing special adaptation to the wants of the age. Vast as it is, the material relating to it is now so accessible that, to accomplish the object intended, nothing is wanting beyond time, judgment, and right feeling. The Book of Genesis. By DR. PETER VON BOHLEN. 2 vols. Chapman. And who, some of our readers may be ready to ask, was Von Bohlen? Von Bohlen was born in the Duchy of Oldenburg, in 1796, of poor parents. But his passion for books was manifested in early life. From step to step, he found friends to assist him, so as to enable him to prosecute his studies. He distinguished himself as a student in Halle, in Bonn, and in Berlin; and after obtaining some lesser preferments, became Professor of Oriental Languages in the University of Königsburg in 1828. His writings are numerous; but his principal works are his Ancient India, and this work on Genesis. Of this work, it will be enough to say that it is written on ultra

Bloomfield's Greek Testament-Princeton Essays.

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rationalistic principles. It deals with the Hebrew Scriptures simply as Hebrew records, containing nothing in any special sense divine, and very much which should be discarded as being untrue, or on other grounds exceptionable. There are minds which seem happy only in the measure in which they can destroy all external certainty in regard to religious truth. The idea of an authoritative book revelation is to them a very nightmare. Von Bohlen was a man of this class, and his book will be welcome to all minds of his own unhealthy complexion. His learning and his acuteness are here profusely expended for the purpose of showing how little there is in the Old Testament for any

man of sense to trouble his head about.

A Historical and Critical Commentary on the Old Testament, with a New Translation. By M. KALISH, Phil. D., M.H. 2 vols.-We could wish that all readers of Von Bohlen on Genesis would become readers at the same time of these volumes by Dr. Kalish on the Exodus. Dr. Kalish is a Jew, well-acquainted with the state of learning on the subject of which he here treats. Should the work, of which these volumes are only a first instalment, be completed on the same scale, it will be the ablest and fullest on its subject in our language. Each of the volumes goes over the same ground, but one gives the Hebrew text along with the translation, and is in other respects more complete. The other is adapted to more popular use. To the scientific inquirer the author commends the larger volume, which, besides other advantages, gives the necessary references, and a statement of the sources.

The Greek Testament, with English Notes. By S. T. BLOOMFIELD, D.D. 2 vols. Ninth Edition. Longmans. It must be no small gratification to Dr. Bloomfield to have been spared to complete this ninth edition of his valuable Greek Testament. The volume of Appendix, which supplemented previous editions, is embodied in the present, together with the results of much further research, especially in relation to the question raised of late about the claims of the earlier Greek MSS., as compared with those of a later date. We think Dr. Bloomfield is nearer the truth on this point than some critics who carry their heads very high in relation to it. So enlarged is this work, that these volumes extend to some 900 pages each.

Theological Essays, reprinted from the Princeton Review. First Series. Edinburgh: Clarke.-The Princeton Essays are for the most part very able productions, and are highly valued wherever known by the theologian and the Christian philosopher. The Messrs. Clarke have here furnished us with a handsome reprint of the first volume, to be followed by the second.

3 vols. Jackson and Walford.

The Congregational Lecture. These volumes complete the issue of the Congregational Lecture in this cheaper and uniform edition to volume fifteen. They consist of the course on Geology by Dr. Smith, the course on the Theology of the Early Church by Dr. Bennett, and of the second part of the course on the Sacraments by Dr. Halley. The wealthy layman would do a good deed who should take care that no congregational minister of

limited means in his neighbourhood shall be without a set in his library.

The Analogy of Religion. By JOSEPH BUTLER, D.C.L., Bishop of Durham. Edited by JOSEPH ANGUS, D.D., Tract Society.-A cheap edition of the works of Bishop Butler, including the Analogy, the Two Dissertations, and the Fifteen Sermons, admirably edited, with analyses, notes, and indexes.

In Germany the great fact observable just now in relation both to theology and philosophy is the fact of reaction. Professor Weisse, of Leipsic, in his Philosophical Dogmatics, shows little reverence for the sages of Tübingen; and A. F. Gfrörer, who was not long since a rationalist of the extreme school, now writes, in his Primitive History of the Race, as a believer in the historical truthfulness of the earlier chapters of Genesis; while Professor Gruppe, at Berlin, Dr. Jessen, and Karl Forslaye are working with no little effect towards the demolition of nearly everything that has been characteristic of German speculation since the rise of Kant, and in the way of a return from the transcendental to the Baconian method. Hitherto we have taken up German modes of thought as the vulgar take up fashions, adopting them when they are dying out. It is not much to the credit of Oxford that she should be seen doing the grand in the cast-off clothes of her neighbours. The time may perhaps come, even in Germany, when a man's labours will be appreciated according to the amount of sagacity he brings to them, and not according to the amount of rubbish he may have turned over in prosecuting them. The drudge may accumulate; the sifting and vivifying power is from another source.

*** We are much obliged to Mr. Martin, of Chatham, for the pains he has taken to make us acquainted with the notice of our labours in the Herald of Peace for November. It would be expecting too much from the rose scented gentlemen who write in that publication to suppose them to be aware that the writings of Lord Kaimes, to whom they attribute opinions which he never held, have their place as a textbook in some of our oldest universities. As to the similarity of expres sion in the sentence cited, it will be enough to say, that it resulted from an exercise of memory of which the writer was wholly unconscious. Years have passed since he has read a line of Lord Kaimes, either in his own writings or elsewhere. But the fanaticism of our peace friends is becoming a very edifying affair, and it is no new thing that fanaticism should be cunning, and so bent upon its object as to be little scrupulous about means.

THE BRITISH

QUARTERLY REVIEW.

APRIL 1, 1856.

ART. I. The History of England, from the Accession of James the Second. By THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY. Vols. III. and IV. Longmans.

MONDAY, the 17th of December, 1855, was a great day in the annals of Paternoster-row. Twenty-five thousand copies of the third and fourth volumes of Macaulay were to be delivered to eager purchasers. The book had been bought to that extent before it appeared; so confident were booksellers of an unprecedented demand. Mudie, the enterprising librarian, had taken a house next to his premises to contain the five thousand five hundred volumes which fell to his share in the great literary scramble. The counters of retail booksellers, generally quiet, and seldom startled by the appearance of even one quite new work, this day groaned beneath a pile of purple volumes. As to the expectant public-although really far less agitated and eager than was anticipated-it manifested, in certain circles, a determination to enjoy the work, such as perhaps has not been felt since the Waverley novels appeared. To judge from a single instance we happened to call on the greatest anatomist of our day, and found him already halfway through the first volume, promising himself to sit up all that night to finish it; neither the charms of the Ant-eater he was then engaged in dissecting, nor the attractions of fossil remains of the Musk ox, could draw him from Macaulay's page. And the book which the great philosopher sat up all night to read, was read with scarcely less avidity in boudoirs by very fine ladies, and by perfectly stupid gentlemen in clubs.

Not a century ago, that is in 1776, the first volume of the