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he is manifested in the gospel, contains its own evidence.' The gospel is a self evident truth;' so that 'to unfold the gospel is to prove it.' After remarking on our Lord's words, John xiv. 6, 11, our author thus further explains himself.

In the light of this passage, the gospel has its evidence in itself. If God is seen in the gospel, in the very sight there must be evidence of his godhead. Is it possible that God shall appear, and yet that it shall not be known that he is God by those who truly behold him? This would be a supposition totally unworthy of God. Jehovah in his glorious perfections is infinitely above all his creatures, and there can be no difficulty in recognizing him when he appears. He that sees God in the character in which he manifests himself in the Scriptures, would as soon look on the sun and ask if it is light, as, on seeing God, ask, Is this God? Even the queen of Persia might mistake the favorite for Alexander, because the friend of the king may have as much appearance of majesty as the sovereign himself. But no man will ever see God, and ask, Is this God? When God discovers his character to the mind, there is self-evidence that he is the true God. They who do not recognize him do not truly see him, though in the Scriptures he stands before their eyes.'-p. 256.

We are not sure that we understand Mr. Carson; and he must excuse us if, among the ideas from which we select one as his most probable meaning, we should mistake him. His view, as we conceive it, is, that the method of expiation for sin by the vicarious sacrifice of Christ for his people-for this is Mr. Carson's exhibition of the scriptural character of God-must necessarily appear to every one who understands it to be the method in which God is actually dealing with men, and a divinely wise and glorious method of dealing with them. We take him to maintain that no man who understands this doctrine can either doubt whether it represents the fact, or refuse his acquiescence in the system. We do not find ourselves able to agree, on the instant at least, in this sentiment.

We are not satisfied as to the ground upon which any such conviction of the truth and excellency of the gospel must be supposed to arise. If any particular representation of God's character is to bring to me an instantaneous conviction that it is a just one, it must be because of its conformity with some ideas of God more or less distinctly preconceived in my mind; just as, if I were to recognize a stranger at first sight, without his being named to me, it would be owing to a conformity on his part to the image I had created of him. Now we know that there are in human nature certain impulses of justice and benevolence, by their conformity to which all representations of the divine character are quickly brought to a species of test by mankind; but we are scarcely prepared to admit that these impulses

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are universally-if in any case-so comprehensive, accurate, and vivid, as to furnish an immediate certainty that some particular representation of the divine character is correct. Have all men such antecedent thoughts of God that they are entitled to say, I know that this description of his character is true, because it agrees with what I have conceived of him?

We can scarcely look with greater satisfaction on the result to which such a sentiment would lead. If, when a representation of the divine character approves itself to the mind of a man, this is to be deemed conclusive of its truth, then such representations as may not gain this concurrence may justly be held in continual doubt; and the mind of man itself may thus become the absolute test and standard of truth. One may then say, Such a view of the divine character cannot be a just one, for my mind revolts from it. Is the human mind in a state of fitness for the office of umpire between contending representations of the character of God?

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Further, we think that facts contradict our author's hypothesis. We can have no hesitation in saying, that many persons understand what Mr. Carson means and exhibits as the character of God in the gospel, who, nevertheless, neither feel any complacency in it, nor believe it to be the mode of his conduct towards men. Mr. Carson, we are aware, meets us at this point by saying that such persons do not understand the gospel. On John xvii. 3, 'This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast 'sent,' he lays it down that salvation is connected with knowledge, in the simple meaning of that term, and that 'we cannot 'know the truth without approving of it.' 'It is much safer,' he adds, as well as more scriptural, to say, that, though 'the true knowledge of God is eternal life, if men are not 'changed in heart and life they do not really know God,' p. 267. For our part, we must say that we think it both more scriptural and more safe to take the term yivwok in the sense of love (a use of it with which Mr. Carson cannot but be familiar), and to allow the result of exercising the understanding, apart from any state of the feelings, to be called knowledge. Upon his principle, what interpretation would the author give to the following passage? If I had not done among them the 'works which none other man did, they had not had sin: but now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father,' John xv. 24.

We think we have done more justice to this volume, and shown more respect to the author, by noticing pointedly the main feature of it, than we should have rendered by a slighter mention of its subordinate parts. From its successive pages we could extract with pleasure many beautiful and valuable pas

sages; but we must hasten to as extended a notice as our limits will permit of the remaining volume.

The History of Providence exactly corresponds with its title. The principal events of Scripture history are taken up in succession, and briefly treated, with great simplicity, judiciousness, and piety. The book is well fitted to become a thoughtful Christian's pocket companion, and it is no small eulogy on both parties, that it was such to the late lamented Dr. Olinthus Gregory. The examination of the philosophy of Dr. Thomas Brown is shrewd and effective, and highly characteristic of the author. A short example will justify our praise. Dr. Brown says that the great charm of the celebrated passage of Genesis descriptive of the creation of light, consists in its stating nothing more than the antecedent and the consequent.' On this Mr. Carson remarks

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With respect to the cause of this sublimity of the celebrated passage in Genesis, I question Dr. Brown's philosophy. It in no measure depends on any theory with respect to power. And, as a matter of fact, men, on feeling the sublimity, never think of the philosophy of the subject. The sublimity, however, does not consist in the stating of nothing more than the antecedent and the consequent. If this were a true prescription for producing sublimity, there is no writer who might not equal Moses. The general ordered the army to dine, and they dined,' is an expression which has the essentials of Dr. Brown's sublimity; but it is never likely to become a rival to the expression in the book of Genesis. In statement there is no difference between the two expressions. What, then, is the essential difference which confers such sublimity on one of them? One of them commands what a command is fit to effect. Command is the usual means employed to produce such effects. The other expression commands what a command has no tendency to effect, even as a means. Not only this, but the command is addressed to what does not exist, and the thing which does not exist is viewed as hearing and obeying the command, by coming into existence. It is here, especially, that the sublimity lies.' -pp. 349, 350.

With a saving clause against being supposed to agree with every thing in these volumes, we must quit them with high general commendation. It is quite evident that they are the production of a writer long habituated to deep and searching thought, and possessing a great command of language. We will only hint to Mr. Carson, who will take it as the sincerest token of our high respect for him, that he would write both more persuasively and more convincingly, if he would study habitually to be what he has elsewhere termed 'extravagantly ' gentle.'

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Art. V. The English Hexapla: consisting of the Greek Text of the New Tes tament, with the six important English Versions, known as Wiclif's, A.D. 1380, Tyndale's, A.D. 1534, Cranmer's, A.D. 1539, The Generan, A.D. 1557, The Rhemish, A.D. 1582, The Authorized, A.D. 1611. London: Bagster. 1841.

THE idea of this work, as well as its title, is taken from the Hexapla of Origen, in which four Greek versions of the Old Testament were arranged in parallel columns, together with the original text, first in Hebrew and then in Greek characters, thus presenting a sixfold copy of the Scriptures, four only of the columns, however, containing translations of the original. We are not aware of any similar attempt to exhibit a series of translations of either the Old or the New Testament, into one language, until the present, and the Messrs. Bagster deserve the thanks of all English biblical scholars for placing before them, at one view, the successive developments of the New Testament in English. The plan of the work is easily explained. At the top of the two handsome quarto pages which are presented on opening the volume, is the Greek text according to the recension of Scholz, printed in a magnificent type, and occupying about one third of each page. The remaining two thirds contain, in parallel columns, six English versions arranged in chronological order, viz., Wiclif's 1380, Tyndale's 1534, Cranmer's 1539, the Geneva 1557, the Rhemish 1582, and the first edition of the authorized version 1611. An historical account ' of the English versions' is prefixed, extending to 160 quarto pages. This account exhibits considerable industry, and will, no doubt, be read with interest; but we are sorry to be compelled to add that its style is open to much censure, and what is worse, its statements are not to be implicitly relied on. The publication of the work before us offered a very favorable opportunity for giving a more accurate account of the English Bible than any which we have at present. Our author has, however, we regret to say, preferred the easier mode of following accounts already published; and an independent investigation of the subject, clearing up obscurities, and rejecting received statements where they are apocryphal, is yet a desideratum in our literature. We shall have occasion to point out some of the historical inaccuracies, and many of the grammatical blunders of the account before us, as we proceed. The history of the English New Testament properly commences with the times of Wiclif. There were, indeed, as early as the eighth century, versions of various parts of the Scriptures into the Anglo-Saxon tongue, but these are connected with us

rather by locality than language;. for though the Anglo-Saxon scholar may very distinctly trace in them the groundwork of our vernacular English, they are at this day as completely unintelligible to the mere English reader, as the Latin itself from which they were taken. It would be out of place here to trace the gradual change of language in England from this period down to that of Wiclif. The dialect of his day, though containing many words not now in ordinary use, is substantially English, Few of the words which he employed have become completely obsolete. The principal changes are those which have taken place in the orthography, and in the tense forms of verbs and plural endings of nouns.

Wiclif, by right, stands foremost in the list of English translators. It is true that there were before him several, who in the early part of the fourteenth century attempted the work, but their productions, whether metrical or in prose, seem never to have exerted much influence, or to have been widely circulated. Many of them were not versions but paraphrases-none contained the whole of the New Testament, and whatever may have been their merits or their importance, all were cast into the shade by Wiclif's version, which, as the author of the Historical Account has shown, may well be considered the first published translation of the New Testament in English. The term 'published,' in reference to Wiclit's version, is not, of course, to be understood in the sense which it now generally bears. A work in those days was published when copies were multiplied for sale by transcribers, and the existence, even yet, of a great number of MSS. of this version is sufficient evidence of its publication, though it was never given to the world in type till it was edited by Lewis in the year 1731.

We shall not follow our author in his account of the life of the Rector of Lutterworth, or the history of the translation; we must at once pass on to the character of the version itself, a subject which is very slightly touched by him, though he expressly devotes one section to the consideration of it. He com-. mences his remarks on this point with the following carelessly written and ungrammatical paragraph.

The importance of this version is such, that some account of its execution and other circumstances connected with it, seem almost to be required; at least, without them, the notice of the labors of Wiclif would be very defective.'—p. 19.

He then proceeds to show that it was necessary that the version should be made from the Latin, on two grounds; first, Wiclif's probable ignorance of Greek; and secondly, his probable inability to procure a Greek MS., if he had been able to

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