question like that of the possible distinction between natural and revealed religion, cannot be so explained. The distinction is a scientific one, and can only be met by arguments having respect to the nature of the subject. Those which refer to the mere character or condition of “the thinker's mind," will not touch the case.

We turn now to the second book of Mr. Parker's Discourse, the subject of which is "Inspiration." Our controversy with him on that subject relates to the limitations which he attributes to the influence of God upon the human mind. The following passage may serve to bring out the point to which we chiefly object:

The

Inspiration, then, like vision, must be every where the same thing in kind, however it differs in degree, from race to race, from man to man. degree of inspiration must depend on two things: first, on the natural ability, the particular intellectual, moral and religious endowment or genius wherewith each man is furnished by God; and next on the use each man makes of this endowment. In one word, it depends on man's quantity of being, and his quantity of obedience."-P. 163.

We are not disposed to controvert the first part of this statement. The sense in which we should adopt it may not be exactly the same as that in which Mr. Parker makes use of it; but the language in which it is conveyed expresses our sense as well as his. By inspiration being "every where the same in kind, however it differs in degree," we suppose Mr. Parker to mean that it is, in all cases, coincident with the natural instrumentalities through which it operates, though it may vary as such instrumentalities vary. We, on the contrary, believe that inspiration may exceed all that such instrumentalities could of themselves indicate. There are certain limits placed by man's faculties to the ascertainment of truth on his part. He is not capable, for instance, of foreknowledge, in the proper sense of that term. We hold that the difference in degree to which inspiration may extend, stretches beyond these limits, and that God may thus communicate to man truth which does not lie within the natural range of his faculties. The communication is made through the channels by which the Almighty ordinarily acts upon the human mind. No new faculty is created for the fulfilment of these miraculous purposes. No new force is exerted on the part of God. We, therefore, regard the supernatural inspiration for which we contend as differing in degree rather than in kind from the natural one which Mr. Parker only acknowledges. We cannot allow that the distinction he draws between kind and degree at all affects the question whether inspiration may be supernatural or not. It may be supernatural, though it "is every where the same thing in kind," by reason of "the degree in which it differs from man to man." To the other part of the passage before us we resolutely object, as a manifest under-statement of the possible conditions of the case with which it professes to deal. There is another thing besides "quantity of being, and quantity of obedience," upon which the degree of inspiration may depend. There is quantity of divine influence. To every act of inspiration there must be two parties,-God the inspirer, and man the inspired. Why should the degree of inspiration be limited to the conditions with which man alone has to do? Why should not the power and purpose of God himself be taken into the account as entering into the conditions of the

subject? They form part of those conditions just as truly as the others do. God, if he sees fit, can communicate inspiration to a human being, irrespective of, or additional to, any proportion fixed by man's natural endowment, and the use he makes of that endowment. It cannot serve the cause of justice to pass by that truth, as if it involved an impossibility. The sophism hidden under this partial representation of the conditions of inspiration cannot escape the slightest attention; and when discovered, it will be found much more dangerous to the character of its author, than any mere failure in the conclusiveness of his argument could be. It indicates a conscious management to conceal the lack of argument. To be sure, it requires little trouble to shew that inspiration cannot be supernatural, if it be assumed that the natural ability and the fidelity of man are to be regarded as its measurement. But such an assumption cannot be permitted by any one who has his eyes open to the plain facts of the case. God as well as man is concerned in the work of inspiration. He is primarily concerned in it. He is its originating cause. degree of inspiration depends upon the amount of energy he may choose to employ. If it be his will to extend his operation beyond the bounds of natural law, the inspiration produced may be such as quantity of being and quantity of obedience" cannot circumscribe.

66

The

Mr. Parker's third book is, as we have said, devoted to the consideration of "Christianity." It presents a very wide field to our observation. We must, for the present, confine ourselves to the general view of the Christian system which it exhibits. It professes to identify the teaching of Jesus with absolute truth, and it places the value of the Gospel in that identification alone. After having stated that the question as to the character of Christianity reduces itself to this-"Is Christianity the Absolute Religion?" Mr. Parker proposes the following method of inquiry into the subject:

"We must distinguish Christianity from the popular conceptions of Christianity-from its proof and its form. To do this, we must go back to the fountain-head, the words of Jesus. We must then take these words in the abstract, separate from any church; apart from all authority, real or pretended; without respect of any application thereof to life that was made by its founder or others."-(P. 180)..... "To determine what Christianity is, we must remove all those extraneous matters relating to the person, character and authority of him who first taught it; we must separate it from all applications thereof which have been made to life; must view it, by itself, as doctrine, as life, and measure it by this ideal standard of Absolute Religion.”—P. 183.

Now if we were to grant that this is a fair mode of judgment, it must be because we had previously granted that the manner in which Christianity is actually proposed to us in the New Testament is not the right manner. For instance, a claim to divine authority constitutes an essential part of the Gospel as it was originally made known. That is the professed foundation of all its other claims. We are here told, that "we must take the words of Christ in the abstract, apart from all authority, real or pretended," and "remove all those extraneous matters relating to the person, character and authority of him who first taught Christianity." If we do so, we commence by subverting the alleged character of that which we have to examine. Should it be the case that we succeed in proving to our own satisfaction that the abstract

truth of Christianity coincides with Absolute Religion, it would not at all follow that we should be thereby prepared to accept the faith of Jesus in the form in which it is actually offered to us. We should only be prepared to do as Mr. Parker does,-assent to the moral doctrine of the system, as separate from the system itself. Such a demand as that which is made in the sentences under our notice, cannot, we think, be acceded to by any one who is not already disposed to treat the declared claims of the Gospel as matters of indifference. But still farther, this method of inquiry goes upon the understanding that we are able of ourselves to ascertain what is Absolute Religion. If so, we cannot, on Mr. Parker's principles, discover any use at all in the inquiry to which he invites us. If we ourselves can discover Absolute Religion, it must be a matter of very little moment whether Christianity concurs with it or not. Such, indeed, as we shall see, is positively stated to be the case. The force of all outward authority on the subject is throughout this work denied; and when that is put aside, it seems to us that every thing else bearing upon the direction of our religious life is contained in the supposed discovery of Absolute Religion. The character of Christianity becomes to us a mere subject of historical curiosity. Such, indeed, and nothing more, according to Mr. Parker's theory, it undoubtedly is. His views as to the relation in which we stand to Absolute Religion are thus expressed: "To ascertain what is Absolute Religion is no difficult matter; for Religion is not an external thing, like Astronomy, to be learned by long observation, and the perfection of scientific instruments, and algebraic processes; but something above all, inward and natural to man. As it was said before, Absolute Religion is perfect obedience to the Law of God-perfect love toward God and man, exhibited in a life allowing and demanding a harmonious action of all man's faculties, as far as they act at all." (P. 180.) This is indeed a strange representation; and we cannot but wonder that any one should have ventured to offer it. It is notoriously inconsistent with fact. In the face of all the follies and sins which this very volume identifies with the religious sentiment natural to man, to inform us that "to ascertain what is Absolute Religion is no difficult matter," is an instance of courage at least. To point out "perfect love towards God and man" as a description of Religion which every man has ready at hand as a standard of judgment by which he may estimate the religious pretensions presented to him, is a still stronger proof of hardihood. Mr. Parker's own account of the intuitive idea of Religion in the human mind, leaves the question of the existence of one or many Gods unresolved by it. And as to the pretence of Absolute Religion being within the power of human discovery, what shall we say of it when examined by the following passage? "From the difference between men, it follows that there must be as many different subjective conceptions of God, and forms of religion, as there are men and women who think about God and apply their thoughts and feelings to life. Hence, though Religion itself is always the same in all, the doctrines of Religion or theology, the forms of Religion or mode of worship-and the practice of Religion which is morality-cannot be the same thing in any two men, though one mother bore them and they were educated in the same way." (P. 37.) Christianity cannot be judged of by the method of inquiry here prescribed. The conditions of such a method do not

exist; and the result of an attempt to apply it would not be an adherence to the interests of Absolute Religion, but an elevation into that character of a multifarious collection of notions, as often false as true, and wrong as right, which could only throw the whole subject into confusion. The state of religious opinion natural to man, renders it plain that the mode in which Christianity is actually presented to us, is the true mode. The authority with which it is invested is wisely employed to give force to the moral obligation involved in its doctrines, instead of our being entirely left to accept or reject those doctrines as they do or do not conform to our present views. It may be instructive to mark the loose manner in which Mr. Parker's view of the subject leads him to treat Christianity as it is described in the New Testament. We meet in his work with numerous sentiments conceived in the same spirit as these:-"The character of the record is such, that I see not how any stress can be laid on particular actions attributed to Jesus." (P. 188.) "If the Evangelists were mistaken in any one point, we can never be certain we have the words of Jesus in a particular case." (P. 198.) "The question whether this or that historical person taught Absolute Religion, is of small consequence to the race." (P. 192.) If all this be true, the endeavour to identify Christianity with Absolute Religion is quite vain and useless. If it be entered upon under such convictions as these, it will result in our moulding the system we may profess to investigate into any form we have previously chosen. This is the result produced in the instance before us. The Gospel, in Mr. Parker's hands, is violently made to speak just what his theory requires, and the same violence would force from it any language whatever. In illustration of this, we may quote the following declaration relating to Jesus Christ:-"He never speaks of his connection with God as peculiar; never calls himself the Son of God in any sense wherein all good men are not also sons of God; never speaks of his doctrines or his works as peculiar to himself which others could not do or teach.” (P. 190.) It is unnecessary that we should offer to such wild assertions as these more than a flat denial. They are too absurdly untrue to demand further notice. They do not, however, by any means, stand alone. The task of reconciling his religious views with his use of the Christian name, is elsewhere accomplished by Mr. Parker in a similar manner. He takes the most unbounded liberties with the Christian records, and where such treatment will not serve his turn, those records are put aside as unworthy of trust. When we call to mind the facts to which we are now alluding, we ask ourselves, Why should this be? Why should a system so manifestly inconsistent with the Gospel, be thus compelled into a union with it? As far as the character of such a system is itself concerned, it loses rather than gains by the connection. A connection so unnatural, and supported by perversions so evident, only increases the difficulties with which the system has to contend. Why, then, is this? We can give but one answer to the question. This state of things arises from the fact, that the truth of Christianity is so firmly fixed in human belief, that it cannot be actually renounced even by those whose principles logically lead to its renunciation. A more powerful testimony in its favour could not exist. The testimony afforded is not, however, in favour of such a representation of the Gospel as this work advocates; but in favour of the representation contained in the

original narrative of its history. It was not the view of Christianity furnished by Mr. Parker that produced the effects which have won his respect and caused him so anxiously to seek for Christian sanction. It was a view to which his theory is essentially opposed: and the efforts he makes to shelter his opinions under the Christian name-violent and yet abortive as they are-may be justly regarded as an involuntary argument on the side of the religion of Jesus, as it was made known by its author.

We have thus gone over a few of the most distinctive sentiments contained in that part of the work before us to which we professed to confine our present notice. Our purpose so far has been little more than that of setting before our readers the true state of the case between Mr. Parker and ourselves. We shall proceed to offer a few remarks upon the general question of Supernaturalism, with which, in one way or other, all the opinions we have hitherto noticed are intimately connected. There are two points relating to that question to which we will direct our attention-the possibility and the use of miraculous interference.

The first of these points is thus introduced by Mr. Parker:

"Are_miracles possible? The answer depends on the definition of the term. The point we are to reason from is the idea of God, who must be the cause of the miracle. Now a miracle is one of three things:-1. It is a transgression of all law which God has made; or, 2. A transgression of all known laws, but obedience to a law which we may yet discover; or, 3. A transgression of all law known or knowable by man, but yet in conformity with some law out of our reach."-P. 201.

The first of these definitions contains our idea of a miracle, though it is not exactly in this language that we should choose to express it. Between the second and the third, we can discover no difference which entitles them to the character of separate definitions. They are, however, thus reasoned upon as distinct from each other:

"To take the second definition: It is no miracle at all, but simply an act which at first we cannot understand and refer to the process of its causation. To take the third hypothesis: There is no antecedent objection or metaphysical impossibility in the case. Finite man not only does not, but cannot understand all the modes of God's action-all the laws of his being. There may be higher beings to whom God reveals himself in modes that we can never know: for we cannot tell all the secrets of God, nor determine à priori the modes of his manifestation. In this sense, a miracle is possible."

P. 202.

Now if "a transgression of all known laws" is not a miracle when it is committed in "obedience to a law which we may yet discover," then "a transgression of all law, known or knowable by man," is not a miracle if it be committed "in conformity with some law out of our reach." The law being "out of our reach" makes it no less a law than does the possibility of our discovering it; and of the third, as of the second class of phenomena, we may equally say, "it is no miracle at all, but simply an act which we cannot understand, and refer to the process of its causation." Whether we cannot "at first," or at all, understand it, makes no difference as to the nature of the case. Why this distinction was insisted upon, we cannot imagine, unless it were to gain credit for a belief in miraculous interference which does not