66

66

This is not an uninteresting theory, but we look in vain for any proofs of it in the Scriptures. Had it been the true doctrine, our Lord and the apostles must, in the nature of things, have inculcated, recurred to and expatiated upon a view of Providence and Grace," which the author denominates equally simple and grand:" where, however, in the New Testament, is there any assertion of this scheme? That there are passages in the Gospels and Epistles which are reconcileable to it, and admit of an apparently easier exposition upon it, amounts to nothing; for the same may be said of almost every hypothesis that human ingenuity has suggested. But we need not press objections, for Dr. Bruce has made as ample concessions, and expressed himself with as much liberality, as a candid opponent could require :

"These convictions have been entertained, both by those who consider our Lord as a Ministering Spirit of the

highest order, and by others who identify him, in his spiritual nature, with the Su preme God. But, as these facts have not been expressly revealed, they should not be enforced, as forming an indubitable article of faith. Nor do I wish to be, or to be thought, dogmatical on every cirredemption. There are many points, on cumstance connected with the process of which it is prudent and becoming, even discretion, and maintain a cautious susat my time of life, to exercise à grave pense. In religion, as well as other branches of knowledge, we should neither hold all things equally certain, nor equally uncertain; but receive them with a measure of assurance, proportioned to the evidence with which we have been favoured, and the information we have been able to acquire. We should always make a distinction between the scheme of redemption, on the part of God and Christ, and the Covenant of Grace between God and Man; and remember that mysteries can make no part of a Covenant."-P. 100.

to this interesting volume. We shall return on another occasion

ART. III-A Brief Account of the Unitarians, with Observations on the Rev. Edward Manley's Answer to Thirty-Five Questions proposed by a Unitarian. By the Author of an Appeal to Scripture and Tradition. 12mo. pp. 68. Hunter.

ART. IV-A Word at Parting, in a Letter to the Rev. Edward Manley; being a Sequel to the Brief Account of the Unitarians, &c. &c. By the Same. 12mo. pp. 48. Hunter.

TH

HOSE that have read the "Appeal to Scripture and Tradition on behalf of the Unitarian Faith," or our review of it (Vol. XIV. pp. 431, 500), need not be assured that these controversial pamphlets are worthy of attention.

The "Brief Account" is a spirited doctrine. sketch of the history of the Unitarian

either to expose the intolerance and The author is not afraid dishonesty of the enemies of the true faith of the gospel, or to avow his dissent from some of the conclusions of its most able and respectable advo

cates.

Mr. Manley, following in the steps. of some of his ecclesiastical superiors, hat said, that the answers given by

Unitarians to the scriptural objections of their opponents were no answers, but mere evasions of the truth by means of false translations, false quotations, interpolations and the like: on which the author before us ob

serves,

"Are Acts ii. 22, and x. 38, and iv. 27, and xvii. 24, or are John viii. 40, and xiv. 1, 10, and xvii. 3, 'false translations' or interpolations'?

"Are the false readings pointed out by Mr. Lindsey, as retained in the authorized Bible version, proved to be such by reference to the oldest MS. and to the original Greek, or are they not?

"Do not the Church of England Clergy retain and defend the text of the three heavenly witnesses, 1 John v. 7, though it was proved to be spurious by Sir Isaac Newton, and though it is rejected by

Michaëlis?

"Have not the Unitarians, whenever they have proposed a revised reading, stated their authorities?

"Was not an edition of the Greek Testament published in 1809, by Dr. Dakins, and dedicated to the Archbishop of Canterbury, which, professing to be founded on the text of Griesbach, the most diligent and accurate collator of ancient copies, yet retained such readings as were marked in that edition as spu rious, whenever they appeared to countenance the system of orthodox theology?" -Pp. 27, 28.

The author describes, with a glowing pencil, the different effects on the devotional feelings of the reputed orthodox and the scriptural schemes of theology:

"If we must believe that God exists in three, who are only one from bearing a common name and sharing a common nature, and who possess distinct attributes, and have therefore claims, differing in condition and degree, on the fear and love of human creatures; and if in

addition to this perplexing theory, involving all the consequences of open polytheism, we construe, by the letter, the personal figures of Jewish allegorists, and erect a Semi-God of evil, and a mythology of demoniacal agents, having power in the moral, and, as some say, even in the physical creation of the blessed God, opposing his laws, interfering with his government, and supernaturally operating on the minds of his rational creatures for the suggestion of crime, then to exclude from the circle of belief the virgin queen of heaven, and the hierarchy of mediatoral saints, and the breaden godhead transmuted and devoured, and the sacraments of sorcery, and the spells

and transformations of witchcraft, were an unreasonable scepticism, and an inconsequent scruple. It is this wood, hay, stubble, built on the foundation of Jesus Christ, which presses, like a mountain of adamant, on his pure and simple gospel: which makes our babes Father ordained praise, shrink at the and sucklings, out of whose mouths their name of the God from whom they are told that Christ has saved them, and tremble at God's malignant and omniwhich has driven the reflecting adult to present rival in the solitude of darkness: seek rest for his foot in the baseless vacuity of Deism, or to shrowd himself in

the blind blackness of Atheism from the

aspect of a maleficent Creator. To him who, in this painful and mutable scene of existence, feels his heart sink within him, and his intellect reel at the tenebrous interpretings and jarring dogmas of the credulous in creeds, to him I would reiterate the injunction of the au thor of the Oracles of God,' and commend the study of the word; the Lord that created the heavens, God himself, that formed the earth and created man

upon it, that same Lord and God, who will not give his glory to another,' mercies are over all his works,' will at 'who ruleth over all, and whose tender once speak peace to him in the consoling assurance that he is one; there is no other tifier; but one and the same God is the God the Saviour; no other God the SancFather, and Sanctifier, and Redeemer;

there is no God else beside me; a just God and a Saviour, there is none beside me;' Isaiah xlv. 21. To whom then will ye LIKEN me, or shall I be EQUAL, saith the holy ONE?'xl. 25.-Pp. 66, 67.

The "Word at parting" is in every page and every sentence ad rem. In reply to a ludicrous creed put into the lips of the Unitarian by Mr. Manley, the author gives the true Unitarian creed, of which we can only spare room for one article, the 9th,

"I believe in the Son of God, but not that this title implies an eternal filiation of nature. If the miraculous conception be adduced, it is still a human sonship, and this day I have begotten thee,' if referring to this, and not to the 'election' of Christ, or to his being born from the dead,' cannot relate to an eternal generation, but to one in time. The miraculous birth of Jesus by the overshadowing of God's spirit or power can no more prove his pre-existence, than the miraculous birth of Isaac, or John the Baptist can prove theirs. They who think the narrative irreconcileable with the rest of the gospels, in which Jesus

ART. V.-A Scriptural Catechism, in which the Answers are supplied by Texts of Scripture; for the Use of Schools and Families. To which is annexed, a Table of Scriptural Terms, with Textual References. By the Editor of Compiled Prayers. 12mo. 44. Hunter. 1s. pp.

THE

HE author of the present Catechisin aims to combine the most

essential points in doctrine and morals with something of an historical connexion. The answers are conveyed in express Texts of Scripture; a method which unites the advantages of simplicity, impressiveness and authority. The framers of scholastic catechisms (as the author remarks) seem to have been little aware how nearly scriptural purity of language is allied to scriptural purity of faith.

This is without exception the best Catechism, upon the whole, that we have seen. We are pleased to see in it the Ten Commandments, with some Notes and the Lord's Prayer.

The Table of Scriptural Terms is excellent-not only children, but many grown persons would find it instructive. We quote the three first

words, "explained conformably with the Jewish Idiom and Usage."

"JEHOVAH. (Self-existing.) The true and living God: Jer. x. 10. The maker of Heaven and earth: Isaiah xliv. 24. Called also the Father: John iv. 23. The Redeemer: Isaiah lxiii. 14. The

Saviour: Isaiah xlv. 15, 21; Titus iii. 4.

"Saviour is also a title of Christ

Jesus whom THE FATHER sent to be the

Saviour of the world: 1 John iv. 14.

spirit of the Father's deity which dwelled "The fulness of the Godhead is the in Jesus: Col. ii. 9; Luke iv. 1.

"A person or people sanctified to JEHOVAH is said to be called by his name: as the Messiah: Jer. xxiii. 6. Jerusalem: Jer. xxxiii. 16.

"THE WORD. The wisdom and power

of Jehovah, Ps. xxxiii. 6; 2 Peter iiiChrist Jesus, John i. 14: who is there5: especially as manifested in the man fore called the Word, Rev. xix. 13: as he is also called the power and wisdom of GOD, 1 Cor. 1. 24.

"The Word is used also for the spoken will of God, 1 Kings xii. 32; and especially the preached gospel, Acts viii. 14. The revealed purposes of God, Rev. i. 2. The gospel doctrine, James i. 21. The gospel warrant for any practice or cus tom, 1 Tim. iv. 5. God's written word or will, the law, Prov. xiii. 13. The Ps. cxix. 49. The word of life is the divine counsels and promises generally, veyed from the Father through Jesus doctrine or promise of immortality con Christ: who is therefore called by its name, 1 John i. 1."-Pp. 26, 27.

IN N our last Number we were proceeding to give some account of the Correspondence relative to the Prospects of Christianity and the Means of promoting its Reception in India, printed at the Cambridge University Press, U. S.; and we expressed our intention to lay before our readers some of its varied information. The Correspondence is, however, republished in England; and we shall,

The English edition (for which the public are indebted to Messrs. C. Fox and Co.) corresponds, page for page, with the American; but the number of the pages includes the Title, and is, in consequence, two more than the American.

the lead. Many versions have been inade; but it is the opinion of Mr. Adam, (p. 9,) that "if the same exertions had been made within a more limited range, the result, if less splendid, would have been more satisfac tory and useful." The information given, as to the system adopted, at least at Serampore, will probably lead the Bible Society to the conviction, that it is of great moment that these various translations should be most carefully revised. The first edition of the Bengallee was marked with "gross blunders ;" and though these have been principally corrected in subsequent editions, yet they must have influenced the translations made from it as the original basis. Having obtained a version of the New Testa ment in one language, when a translation was required in another, Dr. Carey procured a Pundit skilled in both, and put into his hands that already made, directing him to translate from one into the other. If the Pundit understood Bengallee, that was of course the basis; if not, some other translation; and it is reasonable "to suppose," (p. 11,) "that the sense of Scripture must be very much diluted in these successive translations." The only redeeming circumstance is, (p. 12,) that all the versions receive the final corrections of Dr. Carey; but whatever his efforts and knowledge, it is nearly impossible that the Scriptures can be duly represented in translations so made. +

Mr. Adam does not profess to have obtained full information respecting

A pundit means a learned man; and though it has come (like Reverend or Doctor) among us, to describe rather the profession than the attainments of the individual, it still implies his knowledge of Sunskrit. P. 12.

+ There is reason to fear that, in numerous instances, vastly too much haste has been made in the work of translation, difficult as it is even where a competent knowledge of the original is possessed by the translator, and the language into which he translates is vernacular. One of those intelligent Persians whose visit to England was formerly noticed by us, represented the much-applauded translation into Persian, commended for reasons of state, by the Emperor himself, as destitute of those qualities which would have gained for it the respect of the cultivated ranks of the Persians.

the mode in which the Serampore translations have been executed; but what he states is enough to authorize the demand, on the part of those who supply the funds, for more minute information. The following extract is itself sufficient to shew the need of explanation at least:

"A very extraordinary circumstance respecting one of the Serampore versions well, whom I had frequent opportunities was related to me by the Rev. Mr. Bardof seeing in Calcutta, just before his return to the United States, and to whom I refer you for the confirmation of the following statement. The Kankun language is described by the Serampore Missionaries as spoken on the western coast of India, somewhere, I think, between Bombay and Goa, and into this language they have made considerable progress in translating the Scriptures. But Mr. Bardwell declared to me, and, as he aries themselves, that, after all the ininformed me, to the Serampore Missionquiries which he and his brethren had made respecting it, both amongst Europeans and natives, no traces of such a language could be found. Whether the Bombay Missionaries were not sufficiently strict in their inquiries, or whether the language is a new one, invented by the native translator for his own purposes, may to some appear doubtful. I confess myself inclined to adopt the latter alternative."-Pp. 12, 13.

The second direct means of extending Christianity, adopted by the Missionaries, is the publication of Christian Tracts. Mr. Adam gives an extract from the first Report_of_the Bengal Auxiliary Missionary Society, had been published in Bengallee; and containing the titles of those which thus proceeds:

"Such is an account which the Missionaries themselves have given of the subjects of their tracts. I have read all that are mentioned in the above extract, and several others besides, and, with the exception of such as contain simple scripture language, or a simple statement of scripture facts, my opinion of them is, that they are for the most part either mystical, or puerile, or both; which last is the character of three tracts, not long since published by the same Society, which spiritualize a voyage from England, a journey to heaven, and an account of the compass. There is scarcely one fit to be put into the hands of a native of understanding and reflection, and only one, viz. that mentioned above under the