II. Commendation. The representations of the book are true, and made by a wise teacher.

9. "And moreover, because the Preacher was wise, he still taught the people knowledge; yea, he gave good heed, and sought out, and set in order, many proverbs.

10. The Preacher sought to find out acceptable words: and that which was written was upright, even words of truth.

11. The words of the wise are as goads, and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies, which are given from one shepherd.

12. And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh."

III. Its aim and end. The sum of all is, "Fear God, and prepare for his coming judgment."

13. "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter; Fear God and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.

14. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil."

I may now express a trust that the plan here presented gives a just view of the form and structure of this remarkable book. The more closely it is compared with the text itself, the more fully it will appear, I hope, that it is developed naturally from the text, and not arbitrarily foisted upon it.

The Four Discourses all treat of one main theme, namely, that the life and labours of man are, in themselves, vain and unsatisfactory; that success and failure depend upon circumstances,-or, in other words, upon the inscrutable arrangements of God; and that resignation to his will, combining as much innocent enjoyment with as little pain as possible, and depending on wisdom, goodness, and the fear of God, is the only true aim of life. But as no man can secure enjoyment for himself, there must be a future retribution, when the justice so long and vainly yearned for on earth shall at length be realized. The first discourse begins with a plaintive lamentation, and sinks gradually into the deepest tone of despair over the fruitless efforts of the noblest men, finding all wisdom and all labour to be naught but vanity. And if this stumbling-block is removed in the second, so many new proofs of the vanity of man arise, that it is only after repeated struggles that the Preacher brings out the exhortation to "enjoy life." The new doubts again are resolved in the third discourse: but here arises the most trying and critical difficulty of all, namely, that the distribution of the goods of life among men on earth is so utterly out of harmony with their moral character. In the fourth discourse this difficulty is removed,-first, partially, by the thought that the most loathed life is better than death; and

second, completely, by the doctrine of a future retribution, which, in the conclusion, is stated in the broadest and most distinct terms. The high poetic strain which ends the poem, furnishes the keynote to its entire harmony.

ART. VI.-THE PREPARATION FOR CHRISTIANITY IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, A PROOF OF ITS DIVINE ORIGIN.

§ 1.—The Relation of Christianity to the History of the World. In order to understand fully the world-historical importance of Christianity, and the influence which it has exerted upon humanity, it is necessary to have an idea of the external and internal condition of the time in which it made its appearance, particularly in a moral and religious point of view. Although our holy religion, like its Founder, is of divine origin,-a new creation, a miracle in history,--its appearance was nevertheless prepared by the previous course of events. Our Saviour could only be born in the Jewish nation, and he could only appear at the period in which he did appear. For God is a God of order; and as Christianity is destined for men, it must have, like Christ, along with its eternal, divine character, also a temporal and human nature,—and whilst heaven is its Father, earth must be its mother. As such, however, it cannot but be subject to the laws of development, and to the conditions of time. That it might fall as a good seed into the soil of history, that soil had first to be ploughed and properly prepared. All this is very plainly implied in the words of the apostle :-" When the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law." ""*

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This historical preparation of Christianity we must find principally, but not exclusively, in the chosen people, and the sacred records of its religion. For Christ is the light and star, the centre and turning-point, of the whole history of the world. The entire development of mankind, particularly of the religious consciousness of all nations, before His coming, was a preparation for His entrance into the world, a voice in the wilderness:-"Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God." And the entire history of mankind, after Christ's coming, is, in its

* "Ore dè h20e тò пλńρwμa тov xpóvov, &c.: Gal. iv, 4: cf. Ephes. i, 10, and the word of the Lord, Mark i, 15: πeñλńρwτaι ó kaιρós.

ultimate import, an extension of his kingdom and glorification of his name. Only from this point of view is it possible to reach a truly profound and complete understanding both of the old world, which Christianity overthrew, and of the new one, which it built upon its ruins.

In addition to the Jews, it was particularly the classic antiquity which paved the way for Christ's coming. There were, so to speak. three chosen nations in the old world,-the Jews, the Greeks, and the Romans; as also three cities to which a peculiar importance was attached,-Jerusalem, Athens, and Rome. The Israelites were elected for eternal things, the Greeks and Romans for temporal: but time must serve eternity, and earth carry out the designs of heaven. "Greek cultivation," says Dr. Thomas Arnold, "and Roman polity, prepared men for Christianity." The great historian, John Von Müller, confessed, towards the end of his life," When I read the classics, I observed through all of them a wonderful preparation of Christianity: everything suited exactly the design of God, as proclaimed by the Apostles."

It is easy to see that this fact, if it could be fairly established, must form one of the most convincing arguments for the truth and divine origin of Christianity; and it is with this end in view that we attempt to describe in detail the intellectual, moral, and religious condition of the world at the period when "the Word became flesh."

§ 2. Judaism and Heathenism.

But although both religious systems of antiquity prepared the way for Christianity, they did it in a different manner, and this difference we must first bring to view in a general way.

Judaism was the religion of positive, direct revelation, in word and deed,—a gradual condescension and self-manifestation of the only true God to his chosen people in law, prophecies, and types, which all bore witness to Christ. Here, therefore, the process proceeded from above; God entered into a nearer and nearer relation to man, until finally he became man himself, and assumed, in Christ, forever, our whole nature, body, soul, and spirit, into the most intimate union with his divinity. Heathenism, on the other hand, is, generally speaking, nature left to itself,—the development of fallen humanity in the pursuit of God, under the general guidance of providence, to be sure, but still without the special aid of revelation or of a communication of divine life. This the Apostle seems to intimate, when he says of the heathen, that God in times past suffered them "to walk in their own ways." (Acts xiv, 16.) The same idea he expresses more definitely in Acts xvii, 26, 27 :—“ God hath made of

one blood all nations of men for to dwell on the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he be not far from every one of us." Here, therefore, the preparation of the true religion proceeds from below. In Greece and Rome, with which we are now more particularly concerned, human strength was to show what it was able to perform in the state of depravity, and to prove, finally, that even the highest degree of natural culture cannot possibly satisfy the infinite desires of man's mind and heart, but serves rather to make them felt more sensibly, and thus to show the absolute need of a supernatural redemption. From this difference between the Jewish and the Pagan religion, it follows that the first was more a positive, the second more a negative preparation for Christianity. Judaism was the only true religion before Christ, and could therefore only be abolished in its temporal, particularistic form; while its divine contents were preserved and taken up into Christianity. The Saviour did not come to destroy the law or the prophets, but to fulfil them. Matt. v, 19. Heathenism, however, is in its moral and religious substance a corruption of the original consciousness of God; a deification of nature and man,-consequently, error and depravity. Christianity, therefore, is opposed to it in principle, as a specifically different system.* The Old-Testament religion, in passing over to Christianity, fulfilled only its own meaning, and followed its inmost aim; whilst heathenism had to go through a radical revolution, and to abandon itself, in order to reach the truth as it is in Jesus.

This representation, however, does not cover the whole ground. The two religious systems under consideration must be viewed also in a different and seemingly opposite aspect.

For in the first place we find that Judaism, along with the pure development of divine revelation, embodied also (particularly after the extinction of prophecy, and, in its general state at the time of Christ's birth, in the form of Pharisaism, Sadduceeism, and Essenism) more or less human error and corruption, and thus far it was also a negative preparation for Christianity. Against this part of Judaism we find, therefore, Christ and the Apostles just as decidedly opposed as against heathenism.

Heathenism, moreover, was not absolutely without God-was not mere error. It still retained, although in a darkened and corrupt form,

*Compare, for instance, Matt. vi, 7, 8, 32; Rom. i, 18-32; Ephes. ii, 11-13; where the heathen are represented as without God and without hope in this world; Ephes. iv, 17-19; Gal. iv, 8; Acts xxvi, 18; where the heathen state is declared to be a state of darkness and of the power of Satan. Acts xvii, 30; 1 Peter iv, 3-5. FOURTH SERIES, VOL. I.-29

some consciousness of God, which is always a manifestation, and, as far as it goes, a presence of God in the human mind. It had a religious want, and religious susceptibilities; and could, therefore, be reached by the influences of the gospel. Plutarch, himself a heathen, says beautifully and truly, "There has never been a state of Atheists. If you wander over the earth you may find cities without walls, without king, without mint, and without theatre; but you will never find a city without God, without prayer, without oracle, without sacrifice. There may be a city without foundation, rather than that a state could maintain itself without the belief in gods. This is the bond of all society, and the stronghold of all legislation." We can trace in heathenism the relics of the divine image in which man was created, an echo and certain dark recollections of the original communion of man with God, and of that general revelation preceding the calling of Abraham. The myths of the Avatars, of the descending of gods upon the earth, of their union and intermarriage with mortal men, of Prometheus's fall, sufferings, and ultimate deliverance, &c., are dark and fleshly anticipations of the mystery of incarnation and redemption. Instead of furnishing an objection to the truths of Christianity, they go rather strongly to confirm them, and to show that Christianity is founded in the deepest wants of human nature, as they were felt by all nations from the beginning. Especially in the religion, science, and art of the Greeks and Romans we must acknowledge scattered beams of truth; those "testimonia animæ naturaliter Christian," to speak with Tertullian, that is, the testimonies of the soul of man, which is destined for Christianity, a working of the Logos before his incarnation, (λόγος ἄσαρκος, λόγος OTEQμаTIKÓс.) Consequently, there must be there, also, elements of positive preparation for Christianity. For God never left himself" without witness," (Acts xiv, 16, 17;) he has revealed himself also to the heathen, partly in the works of nature, in which the reflecting mind can and ought to see his "eternal power and godhead, so that they are without excuse," (Rom. i, 19-21;) partly in the inward reason and conscience, so that the Gentiles, having not the written law of Moses, are a law unto themselves; which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another." Rom. ii, 14, 15. Therefore St. Paul, when proclaiming to the Athenians the "unknown God," to whom they had built an altar, thus testifying their unsatisfied religious wants, did not hesitate to cite with approbation the passage of a heathen poet, Aratus, on the indwelling of God in man, and to adduce it as proof that it was possible to seek and to find God. Acts xvii, 27, 28. Ac

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