of the Apostles as insignificant, still it is remarkable that the immediate Apostles did not accomplish more for the evangelical message, and that the labours of the most of them should be related already during the first century only in very unwarranted tales. The choice made by Jesus might thus easily appear to have been in a great measure unsuccessful, especially as there was among those who had been chosen also a Judas! But we must not forget that it was important for Jesus in many respects to form a small circle around Him very early, at a time when a great choice was not afforded Him (Matt. ix. 37, seq.), that Jesus must have regarded chiefly moral and intellectual trainableness, and that the final result of His training of the disciples (especially when we remember the turn which the Christian affairs took through the instrumentality of Paul) neither depended upon Him alone, nor even if He did not possess omniscience (which even in John ii. 25, is certainly not attributed to Him)-could with certainty be foreseen.10 He chose men of different individualities (F. Q. Gregorii Diss. II. De Temperamentis Scriptorum N. T., Lipz. 1710, 4to., cf. Hase, Leben J., 112, seq.), part of them of very marked characters (Neander, Leben J., 223, seq.), and it is not to be supposed that He himself meant that they would all be suited for the great calling. Still, the founding of the Church in the Holy Land and its neighbourhood is their work and service. See further the single articles; but concerning the labours of the Apostles (within the scope of the New Testament), Neander, Geschichte d. Pflanz. u. Leitung d. Christl. Kirche durch die Apostel, Hamb. (1832, seq.), 3 Aufl., 1841. 2 bde. 8vo.'

This article has many great excellencies. They are so obvious, that it is unnecessary particularly to specify them. But it has at the same time many grievous defects. Its Bibliographical Notices are very numerous, but not very judiciously chosen. There are various books referred to, which contain no substantial information concerning the Apostles, and there are other valuable authors -such as Suicer, Alban Butler, Lardner, McLean, and Schellingg -who have been entirely overlooked. The Arrangement is far from being distinct and philosophical. The subject should have been treated of under some such great divisions as- The History of the Twelve as Disciples,' and 'The History of the Twelve as Apostles.' By taking the day of Pentecost as the great line of demarkation, and considering the Twelve up to that period as scholars and afterwards as teachers, a much clearer notion of the whole matter might have been afforded. The Information

10- Ammon (Leb. Jesu, ii. 7) represents this as an historical fact.... "When one considers that they (such as Judas, Thomas, Lebbeus, and Simon the Zealot) were found by Jesus to be less serviceable in their calling as teachers, and therefore-without on this account being deprived of their office (!)-superseded by others." (?)'

8 Still more recently, Mr. Stanley has admirably treated of the Apostles in his Sermons and Essays on the Apostolical Age, Oxford, 1847.

h Dr. Winer has no separate article on the Disciples.

considering

considering the length of the article-is very defective. There is really no solid instruction given concerning either the name or the characteristics of the Apostles. There is no adequate answer given to the questions-What is meant by the name Apostle? Wherein does the apostolical office consist? These most important inquiries might have been answered in very small space. The word 'Amoroλos might have been traced to its origin. The corresponding Hebrew term might have been attended to. The different significations of 'Arórroλos might have been set forth somewhat in the same manner as they are to be found distinguished in Wahl and Robinson and Suicer. But of even still greater importance was it for the author to have stated wherein the apostolical character consists. He ought to have given some criteria whereby the apostles could be separated from all other office-bearers in the church. This might have been done very shortly somewhat in the following manner :-I. The apostles are the representatives or ambassadors of Christ, Luke vi. 13. (The same thing is true also of Paul, 2 Cor. v. 20.) Therefore they were immediately appointed by Christ, Mark iii. 14; Luke vi. 13; John xv. 16; xx. 21. (The same thing is true of Paul, Acts xx. 24; Rom. i. 5 ; Gal. i. 1.) II. They are the witnesses of Christ's resurrection, Luke xxiv. 48; John xv. 27; Acts i. 8; x. 40-42. (This also holds good in the case of Paul, Acts xxii. 15; xxvi. 16) Therefore, they saw Christ after his resurrection, Matt. xxviii. 16, 17; John xxi. 1. (This also holds good in the case of Paul, Acts xxii. 14; xxvi. 16; 1 Cor. ix. 1; xv. 8.) III. They are the Authoritative Teachers of Christianity and Founders of the Christian Church, Matt. xviii. 18; John xx. 23; (Paul received the same commission, Rom. i. 1-5; Gal. i. 11— 17.) Therefore, they were empowered to work miracles and were inspired by the Holy Ghost, Matt. x. 1; Mark iii. 15; vi. 7; xvi. 20; Luke ix. 1; Acts ii. 43; Matt. xxviii. 20; Luke xxiv. 49; John xiv. 16, 17, 26; xvi. 13-15; xx. 22; Acts i. 8; ii. 1-4. (Paul received the same gifts, 2 Cor. xii. 11, 12. Acts ix. 17; 1 Cor. ii. 10-13.) Many of the Doctrinal Views brought forward by Professor Winer in this article on the Apostles are entirely spurious. It does not lie, however, within our scope to give a lengthened refutation of them. Several are so absurd as to need no refutation. They are too trifling to be confuted, and deserve to be mentioned only that they may be despised.'i Others, though known to be false, cannot be shown to be so without impugning the author's whole standpoint. His seventh note contains the most remarkable of these vagaries. Some of them might be re

i Pitt.

garded

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garded as truly ridiculous-if any opinion upon such a momentous subject could with propriety be spoken of as ludicrous. When he asserts that the occurrence on the day of Pentecost, recorded in Acts, chap. ii., is to be explained, 'partly psychologically and to be regarded partly an embellished tradition of the tale,' it could have been wished that the learned author had taken the trouble to have given some reason for such a strange notion. He then goes on to say, that the disciples, absorbed in ardent and ecstatic contemplation, upon hearing a peal of thunder, believed that they saw fiery flames which descended upon them, and that, becoming powerfully affected, they broke out into all the vivacity of the Oriental character in adoration of God and exhibited to those present an unwonted spectacle!' Such a statement, however, is but a piece of drivelling rationalism, without any foundation to rest upon. It is quite true that the Oriental style is often bombastic and exaggerated; but any man of common sense can most easily make a very marked distinction between the plain, unadorned narrative of Luke and such Orientalism as 'The armies of the English ride upon the vapours of boiling caldrons, and their horses are flaming coals! whirr! whirr! all by wheels! whiz! whiz! all by steam!' k When he goes on further to speak in the same note of the legendary character' of Luke's history, though he thus takes a very convenient method of helping himself out of the difficulties of naturalism, he certainly does not take a very warrantable or safe

one.

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But, notwithstanding all this, it is somewhat pleasing to find such a man as Winer stating in his preface to the last edition of his Dictionary, that upon the whole there appears to him to be contained even in the Old Testament more true continuous history than is now granted by many, and that he has learned during his labours this time also to entertain a higher respect for the Bible.' Both for his own sake and that of the Christian Church, it would be well if a man of such unquestionable learning as the Leipzig Professor would feel himself induced in mature age not merely to make such concessions as were made in bygone days by the aged Eichhorn and E. F. C. Rosenmüller, but also, like his contemporaries, Leo, Tholuck, and Hengstenberg, to abandon rationalism altogether, and, with genuine simplicity, to receive the Holy Scriptures as a true and credible declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us,' and, as fitted under the blessing of the spirit of God, to make us wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.'

VOL. IV.--NO. VII.

Eothen, p. 15.

D

CHRISTIANITY

CHRISTIANITY IN HARMONY WITH OUR

FACULTIES.

A SERMON.

Translated from the French of the Rev. ATHANASE Coquerel, Pastor of the Reformed Church at Paris."

See that vast edifice in which you may wander as in a maze: the architect who planned it knows all its intricacies, and will lead you through them all in turn; the plan of this or that palace is ever spread out in idea before him in its very least compartments. Behold this ingenious apparatus, vomiting forth steam, or smoke, or flame, and which to your ignorant eyes appears but a confused assemblage of springs and wheels; the mechanist who made it will explain to you beforehand the movement of every branch of iron, and will prove to you how the play of the smallest pieces contributes to the power of the whole. This knowledge belongs to them as it were by right; the idea of a work is in the mind of the workman, and the proof that he knows his work lies in the fact that he was able to produce it. Extend these simple principles, and apply them to the work of creation and if your faith accept this dogma in all its mysterious simplicity; if you be well convinced with Moses, that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth; if you believe that creation is a drawing forth from nonentity-these principles, when applied to God himself, retain all their justness; and it is very certain that the Creator knows his creation.

This science of God includes man, and the Psalmist may well exclaim in support of his confidence, God knoweth whereof we are made. Man and his double nature, his covering of dust, which

a We gladly insert this Sermon, for the translation of which we are indebted to the pen of an accomplished lady- -not only from the beauty and originality of the views which are embodied and eloquently enforced in it, but on account of the peculiar interest which (especially at this time) attaches itself to the name of the excellent and gifted author. The subject is one that seems to us highly appropriate to the pages of this Journal.

must

must return to dust, and his living soul, his immortal spirit, which shall return unto God who gave it-man, in the fullness of his nature, is known to God. This admirable body, at once so strong and so feeble, with its wonderful organs, its inmost structure, a labyrinth of science, wherein observation loses itself, its delicate fibres, whose action escapes the most learned and sometimes the most cruel experience, all this organized matter which God has thought fit to serve for a time as the instrument of our soul, is laid bare before him; and the Psalmist was right when, in his magnificent thanksgiving, he said to God, My bones are not hid from thee; though I be made secretly, and fashioned beneath in the earth, thine eyes did see my substance, yet being imperfect; and in thy book were all my members written. God knoweth

whereof we are made. And our soul, the faculties it is endowed with, its amount of reason, its force of sensibility, its length of memory, the delicacy of its moral sense, and power of its religious instinct, and the ardour of imagination, and the reciprocal action of temperament and habit, of nature and education, the degree of influence possessed by the soul over the body, and that still more mysterious tyranny exercised by the physical being over the moral being-all these secrets which are often unfathomable for us who bear them in ourselves, are no secrets for God. Our immortal soul is his work as well as our perishable body, and God knoweth whereof we are made.

I pause to enlarge upon this reflection of the royal prophet, which is taken from one of his most sublime compositions. David applies the words of the text especially in a spiritual sense, the idea being otherwise familiar to his genius, and often repeated in his poems. His faith and piety were moved by the gravity of this principle. It may be said indeed that religion is wholly influenced by this principle, and you do away in a manner with the notion of a Divine Creator if you hesitate to admit that he knows his creation. Providence rests upon this principle; the direction of the world is only possible on the condition of its being known, and known in detail, to the extent that, according to Christ, the very hairs of our head are all numbered. Moral responsibility rests upon this principle; the judgment of mankind is only feasible on the condition of mankind being known, and if every intention of our hearts, each look of our eyes, each word of our lips, be not laid bare before God, how shall he ask account of us of all our ways? Even Redemption rests upon this principle; this invaluable and immense remedy, offered for the evil which is the canker of humanity both during life and in death, was only practicable on the condition of that evil being known; and if God, by his supreme knowledge had not known the amount of

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sin