No. 1204. Fourth Series, No. 65. 29 June, 1867.

Hon. Mrs. Norton,
Saturday Review,

Gayarre's Philip II., 830. Sheridan in Lee's Last Campaign, 831. Battle Fields of Virginia, 831. Three Years in Field Hospitals, 832. Character and Characteristic Men, by E. P. Whipple, 832. Historical Memoirs of the Society of Friends, 833. Knights Templars of Pennsylvania, 833. Our Artist in Peru, 833.

4. Beauty and the Beast. By Miss Thackeray.

5. The League of Peace

Cornhill Magazine,

London Review,

PAGE

803

819

833

854

POETRY: A Dream of Summer, 802. To Charles Lamb, 802. O I'm a Good Old Rebel, 802. Lay of the Little Wife, 817. Ye Working-Men of England, 829.

Index and Table of Contents of Vol. 93.

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From the Christian Observer.

"ECCE HOMO:" A SKETCH.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "ESSAYS ON THE
CHURCH.

As I am about to make some remarks on a volume lately published, bearing the above title, it may be as well to state at the outset, that I have not read a single page of that work. Hence what I have to say can be no review, or criticism, or reply; and as to competition or rivalry, that of course will be wholly out of the question,- between a volume, prepared, I suppose, with much care and thought; and a magazine-paper, thrown off in the course of a few hours.

But if I had anything to say with reference to that work, why did I not make myself acquainted with it? A few words of explanation will convey my answer to this question.

read. And so began and ended my acquaintance with that volume, until I took it up again a day or two since, merely to verify the above quotation from the Preface.

Did I, in so putting it from me, act unjustly or arbitrarily? I think not. I believe that I merely followed the course usually taken among men; by placing the inquiry, Who Christ was? before, and not after, the inquiry, What Christ said? It seems to me that, in ordinary life, we all seek to learn who the speaker is, before we begin to listen to him.

If I have a dispute with a powerful neighbour, which seems likely to lead to serious consequences, and suddenly receive a visit from a stranger, who proffers his good offices as a mediator, discusses terms, and even makes proposals, my first inquiry is, Who is the person who thus interposes between us? Till I can learn this, I can hardly attend to what he says. I want to understand his motives; I want to know what authority he has to offer terms. Until I can get an answer to these questions, I can scarcely bring myself to listen to anything he utters.

A courteous and accomplished stranger obtains an interview with the Prime Minister, and states to him that he is the bearer of a private and important communication from a great continental sovereign. His appearance and manners may be very much in his favour; but most assuredly the Minister, if he listens to him at all, will, in the very first instance, claim to have the most entire satisfaction as to his real character, and as to his credentials. And if the visitor should express a desire to postpone this point until a future occasion, the reply would certainly be, "No, the question of who you are, and with what authority you are invested, is the very first point to be entered upon. Until these matters are placed beyond a doubt, it is impossible for me to hear, or to utter, a single word.”

When the book alluded to appeared, for the first few weeks it did not fall in my way. But not very long after its publication, I met with a review of it in the High Church newspaper, the Guardian, in which it was praised with no common praise. Soon after this, the leading Dissenters' journal, the British Quarterly Review, "hailed the work with gratitude and reverence;" and the North British Review, founded by Dr. Chalmers, as the organ of the Free Church of Scotland, "expressed | hearty delight" at the appearance of a book which "treated the Christian faith in a truly Christian spirit." This unusual concurrence of approval, from three very different quarters, excited my attention; and happening to meet with the work about that time, I took it up with a half-formed intention of reading it. But, glancing at the Preface, I was startled by one or two expressions on which my eye fell, such as "No theological questions are here discussed. Christ, as the creator of modern theology I see that the writer, in a second Preface, and religion, will make the subject of anoth- admits the general accuracy of the remark, er volume; which, however, the author does that "half the truth is commonly a lie; not hope to publish for some time to come.' "but endeavours to turn aside its application These words acted with a repelling force. to the present case, on the ground that he "What!" I mentally exclaimed, "a serious has avowed the fragmentary character of inquiry as to the Incarnate Theos, from his production, has offered it merely as which all Theology is excluded!-is not an instalment, and has promised to comthat a strange idea." And the contents of plete his view of the subject on some future the book, I found, consisted of discussions occasion. I admit that this is something as to the words of Christ, while the prelimi- like an answer; but I do not think that it nary question, "Who Christ was?" was is a complete or satisfactory answer to the postponed to some future occasion. This objection. mode of proceeding seemed to me so utterly unreasonable, that I closed the book at once as one which it could not be worth while to

From the days of Solomon's Judgment down to the present time, it has been seen again and again, that there are numberless

cases in which two halves are far from being | The subject, viewed in its breadth and
equal to the whole. And certainly, when length, is the highest and noblest that the
engaged in the portraiture of character, to human intellect can search into. If han-
examine certain parts of a man's life now, dled in a suitable spirit, with humility and
intending to consider the remainder a year reverence, it must have a tendency to ele-
or two hence, is not a course which com- vate and expand the mind, and to bring in-
mends itself to the judgment. A biogra- to action the best affections of the soul.
pher might, if he liked, offer us a life of And in this way, I would fain hope, some
George III. considered as a private gentle- solid benefit may arise, even from a discus-
man, purposely omitting all reference to his sion which many good men feared would be
acts or words as a reigning sovereign. Or, perilous and harmful.
a memoir of the Duke of Wellington, exclud-
ing all his military career, and regarding
him merely as a statesman. But what
would be the result? Merely the painting
of two imaginary portraits; the presenting
to the mental gaze two men who never had
any existence; two fictions of the imagina-
tion. No judicious student of history would
attach the slightest value to such produc-
tions. The fruit of all the artist's labour
would only be the depicting of two men who
never really lived upon this earth.

The wellknown words, "Ecce Homo," carry the mind back to a time when, and a place wherein, was transacted the greatest event that ever occurred on this earth. To understand its momentous character, and its bearing on the destinies of the human race, let us endeavour to deal with it in the spirit of an impartial and uninformed inquirer. I will ask myself, How should I have regarded this transaction had I been an educated Greek, Egyptian, or Asiatic, visiting Judea at that time. I propose to abstract myself, for a time, from all the ideas acquired in past years, and prepare to examine the question, de novo, as one who has everything to learn respecting it.

There is, I believe, only one way of arriving at a satisfactory conclusion in any such inquiry. First, collect, with sedulous care, all the facts of the case. Then, when you are certain that nothing has been omitted, begin to arrange, and distribute, and set in order; giving to every fact and every word its proper place and due value. Thus, by degrees, certain premises will be thoroughly established, from which inevitable conclusions will follow. But if the inquirer begins by saying, "We will exclude from our present view half the facts of the case, and will reserve them for some future investigation," he will assuredly get, not a truth, or a reality, but a mere fancy portrait.

In the city of Jerusalem, then, in the month of April, in the year 4034 of the earth's present history, the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, brings forth a bleeding prisoner, whom he has just ordered to be scourged, and, standing in front of the Hall of Judgment, says to the raging multitude, "Behold the Man!" He tells them further that he has found no fault in him. But they, incited by the priests, demand that the prisoner shall instantly be crucified. And when the governor demands why he should be so punished, their reply is, "Whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Casar." Pilate acquits the prisoner of this charge of treason; but, yielding to the clamour of the people, he, at last, gives the order, that he shall be crucified.

These reasons for having disregarded the book for all these months past, may be deemed valid or invalid;-I only state them as having had influence with me. Such as they are, they created in my mind, at the outset, an utter carelessness about a book concerning which other men were disputing. I neither read the work itself, nor In fact, this charge of treasonable designs any of the numerous reviews of it. Only was a mere pretext. Searching into the within the last few days have other state of mind of the Jews and their rulers, thoughts arisen. I have fancied that it I discover, that they entertained such a might be possible, and useful, not only to hatred of the Roman dominion, that if a express an opinion that the author had man, clothed, as this person appears to have gone to work in a wrong way; but also to been, with superhuman powers, had really attempt a sketch, a mere outline, of how, in raised the standard of insurrection, the very my view, the subject ought to be handled. men who now cry "Crucify him!" would For the composition of such a work as I have been foremost among his most enthusicould wish to see written, I have neither astic followers. I find, on looking a little the leisure nor the requisite ability. But it further, that while they alleged treason seems an easier task to indicate, to mark against him before Pilate, their more sincere out roughly, a line of inquiry which some accusation, in the council of the high-priest, one of greater powers may perhaps take. I was, that he had spoken blasphemy, telling

them that he was "the Son of the Blessed," ed ages before. In these cases, however, and that hereafter they should see him sit- there is generally an entire absence of both ting on the right hand of power, and coming parentage and authority for such a predicin the clouds of heaven. I see, therefore, tion. I want, therefore, to know whether that the enmity of the Jewish rulers arose any rational account can be given of this from his asserting his Divine character, his expectation; and whether it can be traced Godhead, and his future appearance to to any respectable origin. judge the world; while their public charge against him before the governor was, that he made or represented himself as a king, and so 66 spake against Cæsar." In these facts I discover, then, enough to increase my desire to learn something more of his true character.

The Jews reply, without hesitation, that they have ancient books existing, some 500, some 1000, and some 1500 years before the days of Jesus and of Pontius Pilate, all of which books, in many passages, written at different times and by different writers, point to a coming Messiah, Deliverer, Redeemer, and Saviour. All these predictions, they aver, were divine: were spoken to, or impressed on the minds of, the writers of these books by God himself. And thus they maintain that the coming of a Christ, or anointed one, to save His people, was a prediction issuing from the throne of God. Let me look, then, with attention into this matter. Is there really any ground for believing that such a promise, or prediction, among the Jews for many hundreds of years before the time of this person's'appearing? I ask for the proofs of this fact, and am referred to the following passages:·

Carrying my inquiry a little further, I find that these same Jewish priests had been, for years past, expecting some such person, a teacher, ruler, and Saviour, to be sent to them from heaven. This expected prophet, or Redeemer, was commonly spoken of as "the Christ," or 66 Messiah," or "the Anointed One." The belief in the coming of such a person, about that time, was universal among the Jews; and when John, a preacher who preceded Christ, began to excite attention, the priests sent to him to inquire, "Art thou that prophet? art thou the Christ?" John also, when he heard of Christ's wonderful works, sent to him to ask, "Art thou He that should come?" But not among the Jews only did this expectation prevail. It had spread even to the most learned and inquiring of the Greeks. And thus, in the Dialogues of Plato, when Socrates sees Alcibiades on his way to the temple of the gods, he raises the question, whether men can really tell how to pray or what to pray for; and suggests, at last, that it might be more prudent to suspend the intended sacrifice till some one commissioned from heaven should come to instruct us to which his friend responds, "And I think he will come, and that before After the lapse of several generations, I long." Not among the Jews only, then, but am next pointed to Abraham, from whom even among the wisest of the heathen, did the Jewish people descended. To him, an expectation prevail about that time, that more than fifteen hundred years before the some one would soon appear, sent from days of Pilate and of Christ, God is recordheaven, to instruct men in the great ques-ed to have made a solemn promise, tion of their relations towards God.

It is recorded in the earliest writing of their earliest prophet, Moses, that when the first man transgressed his Maker's commandment, and fell from his favour, (and this fall, I know, is recognized as a fact by many old writers who were not Jews), God, in sentencing him to banishment, did speak of a Seed of the woman who should bruise the head of the serpent, the seducer. This seems to me exceedingly vague, but it does assuredly point to some future strife between the powers of good and evil; of some descendant of Eve, who shall have a contest with the Evil One.

"In

thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." The hope here held out is still nebulous and cloudy; but an evident advance is made. A single family of mankind is pointed out, and the patriarch is assured that a blessing to all mankind_shall in some way proceed from the people, or some, or some one, among the people, who shall acknowledge him as their forefather

This remarkable fact being placed beyond a doubt, I desire next to learn something of its origin. How did such an expectation as this obtain currency, not among the ignorant multitude merely, but among the wisest and the best of both Jews and Gentiles? Its general prevalence is a striking and important fact; but standing alone, it does not quite content me. Old prophe- and head. cies abound in all countries; and few great Nearly about the same period of the men or great events occur without our be- earth's history, appears another remarkable ing told that their coming had been predict-person, an eastern prince, or great man,