circumstances that had occasioned it. Dr. Strauss had, in a periodical journal published in 1838, declared that nothing was left to our age of religious disorganization but a worship of genius, “i. e. a reverence for those great spirits who form epochs in the progress of the human race, and in whom, taken collectively, the godlike manifests itself to us most fully: he had even included Christianity under this worship of genius, by assigning to its Founder the first place among those men of genius who have promoted human progress." In 1839, there was celebrated at Stutgart the inauguration of the statue of Schiller. Gustavus Schwab dilated on the occasion with national enthusiasm on the merits of the poet. His language was construed into "an act of religious worship, as an idolatry of genius." This induced Ullman to address his friend Schwab on the subject. He is careful at the outset to protect both his friend and the mass of the people who participated in the inauguration from the charge of having designed the ceremony as an act of idolatry. Schwab, he admits, would have been the first to protest against such an interpretation. At the conclusion of his address, which is characterized as beautiful, and worthy alike of the Christian preacher and the poet, he declared that "it is not to genius that the highest honour is ascribed, but to Him from whom genius proceeds."

In exposing the unsubstantial and worthless character of the new worship, Professor Ullman has not a difficult task. We English readers cannot, as we peruse his Essay, altogether dismiss from our minds the impression that he is fighting mere shadows-that no real combatant will enter the lists to defend the positions which he assails-that infidelity, if it has ever in its wantonness thrown out the idea that Genius is the only object to which worship is due from the cultivated mind, will soon abandon this feeble outwork, assured it cannot stand an hour against the vigorous assault of the Theist, whether he be Christian or not. As far as England is concerned, we believe this book is not needed. We are glad, however, to have had the opportunity of reading it in so elegant an English dress. It presents a confutation of infidelity in its most curious phase, and may perhaps suggest to some minds the impossibility of finding rest or peace for the soul, short of perfect faith in that Great Being who giveth to man his varied powers, and who has seen fit to reveal the choicest treasures of divine knowledge, not to the wise and prudent whom the world honour for their genius, but to prophets and apostles and his beloved Son, who, as compared with the sons of genius, were truly described as "babes."

The translation of these Essays of Ullman is admirably executed by Miss Sanford.

Redemption, its Nature and Connection with the Death of Christ. By William Le Page. Wortley-Jos. Barker. 12mo. Pp. 76.

WE have already had occasion to welcome Mr. Le Page, of Guernsey, as an able and zealous labourer in the field of Christian Reform. This new production enhances our opinion of him as a careful and well-informed interpreter of Scripture. His object is to open out the divine plan of redemption, as developed partially in the Jewish and entirely in the Christian system. In the first part of his pamphlet, he shews that the sentence of death pronounced on our first parents denotes simply man's mortality; he combats the position that sin is an infinite evil, and that it can be atoned for by vicarious suffering. In the second and larger portion, he traces the connection between the death of Christ and man's redemption. Instructed by Christ's apostles, our author finds the grand key to this mysterious event in the resurrection of Jesus. In every professedly orthodox scheme of Christianity, the doctrine of Christ's resurrection, although it formed the great topic of apostolic discourse and writing, is lamentably neglected. In the Christianity of human creeds, the resurrection is not wanted; the scheme of redemption is completed by the

death of the great vicarious sufferer. In Unitarian Christianity alone does the resurrection of Christ take its rightful place, as the greatest of all events, as an everlasting token of the truth of the Gospel, of God's mercy, and of Christ's triumph as the Saviour of mankind.

To young persons desirous of information respecting the meaning of Scripture, and to those who are feeling their way from a cramped and technical to a liberal and enlarged theology, Mr. Le Page's little work will render valuable assistance.

SINGLE SERMONS, &c.

1. The Gospel making Man Happy: a Sermon on behalf of the London Domestic Mission Society. By Henry Hawkes, B. A., F. L. S. Pp. 60.

2. Rev. W. Smith's Unitarianism Reconsidered, &c., being a Reply to Archdeacon Digby's Pamphlet, entitled Unitarianism Considered.

3. Rev. R. Shaen's Discourse, preached in Clyde-Street Hall, Edinburgh, June 7, 1846, on the True Criterion of Sin, and our Treatment of Evildoers, with reference to American Slaveholders.

4. Rev. Henry Knott's Sermon, preached at the Chapel in Church-gate Street, Bury St. Edmund's, on the Decease of Mr. John Watson.

5. Rev. Thomas Binney's Two Sermons, preached on occasion of the Death of Rev. T. S. Guyer, of Ryde, Isle of Wight.

6. Rev. P. P. Carpenter's Address to Christian Professors, delivered at Stand Chapel and various other Places.

7. Rev. F. Knowles's Brief Manual of the Trinitarian Controversy.

AN inconvenient accumulation of works on our Editorial table compels us to put these pamphlets together, and to give to each but a brief notice.

1. Mr. Hawkes's Sermon was addressed to the Brixton congregation. It treats the Gospel as a blessed reality, designed by the Father of Spirits as a remedy for the worst ills of earth, and fully equal to the benignant work. The Sermon might be improved by compression, but the thoughts are suitable, and its spirit is worthy of the holy cause which it advocates.

2. This is one of the good fruits of the "Western Union." Mr. Smith proves Unitarianism to be in accordance with the first Commandment as delivered by God to Moses, the Lord Jesus Christ to his disciples, and the apostle Paul to the church at Corinth. He exposes with proper severity some coarse attacks by Archdeacon Digby, and some criticisms by that divine, as discreditable to his learning as to his taste. The pamphlet will, we trust, arouse theological inquiry at Torquay.

3. Mr. Shaen in this discourse proves himself both a judicious and an amiable moralist. He wishes no foul blow to be struck in a good cause. The downfal of Slavery he ardently desires, but he does not sympathize with, or approve of, every mode of agitating the question. The proceedings of the agitators for emancipation in Edinburgh have had more of passion than justice or wisdom.

4. A very appropriate and comforting discourse. The character of the deceased is briefly but happily delineated.

5. The body of Mr. Guyer, who had for twenty-eight years been known and respected as an Independent minister in the town of Ryde, was refused interment at Binstead church, by the Rev. Philip Hewett, on the ground of his not being a parishioner or a member of the Church. The refusal to permit the burial of Mr. Guyer was the more extraordinary, and to his family distressing, as the bodies of two of his children had been interred in the churchyard at Binstead. The disgust occasioned by the Rector's conduct produced great excitement in the town of Ryde. The feeling was not confined to the flock of the deceased, but was shared by persons of all sects; in proof of which, an address of condolence was forwarded to the widow, signed by fifty-nine gen

tlemen of the first respectability in the neighbourhood, of whom three were clergymen and all Churchmen. Mr. Binney's Sermons (the first of which refers to the death of his venerable friend, and contains a beautiful tribute of respect to his character; the second is a discourse on the pretensions of Episcopacy, concluding with some very just remarks on the refusal of a grave) were preached in his ordinary ministrations to his own people. They are published by request, the author being induced to yield to the request from the consideration that "acts of assumption and intolerance on the part of some of the clergy are getting somewhat common." Mixed up with the second sermon, with the Preface and with the voluminous Notes, are Mr. Binney's views and hopes concerning the Evangelical Alliance, for which we think he might have found a more appropriate utterance at another time. The following extract will shew how Mr. Binney treated his painful subject of the refusal of a grave to the body of his aged and honoured friend:

"It is high time that the pious and excellent men in the Church of England should come forward and speak out about these matters. Let us know what the Church really is, and how far such an atrocity as that which has occasioned this lecture is to be attributed to the system or to the man. The man himself attributes it to the system; many of the adherents of the system charge it upon him. I well know how such an outrage on all the feelings of our common humanity pains and fills with grief many a holy and loving soul in the Establishment; how they lament and mourn over it, and pity and blame the individual by whom the offence cometh.' Still there it is. The thing is done. At any moment it may be repeated. But no voice from within the sanctuary issues forth to explain to us how it came to pass, or to tell us where the blame lieth. Of course we prefer to bury in places that admit the use of our own rites and the services of our own ministers; but sometimes this must needs be departed from, and it is not well to be exposed, without warning, to severe and sudden exasperations of sorrow. It is sad that 'the law of the Church' should oblige to the commission of this apparent wrong; or sad that any system should be such as to be capable of being abused (if it be abuse) to such an end, according to the opinion or caprice of individual ministers."-P. 76.

6. Mr. Carpenter's Address is "a parting tribute of affectionate interest to the members of the Stand congregation." It is earnest and apostolically simple. As a companion to this, which is a plea for religious anxiety, we should wish to see a persuasive to religion founded on its hopes, comforts and supports.

7. In a very short compass, Mr. Knowles has compressed a considerable quantity of Scripture interpretation bearing on the Unitarian controversy. The "Manual" deserves the notice of Tract Societies and distributors.

PERIODICALS.

Edinburgh Review, No. CLXIX.-We were unable last month to give any notice of the Periodicals, only one of which, indeed, the Edinburgh Review, particularly claimed our attention. The current No. is scarcely an average one, either as respects its subjects or the mode in which they are treated. Still there are two or three articles that will repay attention. The "Life and Genius of Leibnitz" is well written, and evidently by one possessing the requisite knowledge of his subject. How wonderfully varied were his attainments and powers, how beautiful his spirit! The reviewer's observations on the latter are amongst the happiest passages of the article.

"It is impossible to imagine a controversial spirit more fair and candid; nor was there ever a taste in literature more catholic than his. He ever seems to differ from others with reluctance-to diminish the interval of disagreement as much as possible-and to discover resemblances where none but himself can perceive them. He has given an amusing account of his efforts, when a youth of only 15, during long solitary walks in the wood of Rosenthal, near Leipsic, to adjust the claims of the ancients and moderns, of Aristotle and Des Cartes; and the reluctance with which, when conciliation was impossible, he was compelled

to make an election. His spirit was truly eclectic; and so far from exaggerating the originality of his own conceptions, he is generally anxious to shew that there are some traces of them, more or less faint, to be found in the preceding history of philosophy. Even when threading his way through the most intricate and untrodden wilds of speculation, his truly social spirit loves not to be alone; he delights in searching for traces, however faint, of footsteps that have been there before him, and to follow the trail of humanity, as the Indians would say, even though it be only by a broken twig, or the down-trodden grass, or the ashes of a long extinguished watch-fire."-Pp. 21, 22.

Nor can we resist the pleasure of extracting an interesting passage, in which the working of the genius of Leibnitz is described as anticipating many of the after-discoveries of knowledge and science.

"In all departments of science except the mathematics, it is rather in his comprehensive suggestions of a possible law or principle, than in rigidly establishing it by induction,-rather in his sagacious anticipations of a great truth, than in ascertaining its exact limits, that his chief merit consists. And it is curious to observe in how many different departments of science this tendency of Leibnitz was manifested. Thus in his Protogea, he throws out thoughts which, as Dr. Buckland observes, contain the germ of some of the most enlightened speculations of modern geology. In the department of philology he often makes the most sagacious observations on the history and affinities of languages, and on the proofs of their identity of origin; and was probably the first to predict the important connection-so fruitful of results-which would be found to subsist between philological and historical researches, and the light which the former might be made to shed on the latter. In various parts of his writings, he judiciously points out the best methods of improving medical science. In one of them,-a Letter, Sur la manière de perfectionner la Médecine, he suggests the importance of a system of complete statistics of public health and disease; in his controversy with Stahl, he urges the study of anatomy, then in its infancy; and expresses his confident belief that the time would come when surgery would be capable of dealing with many diseases that were then the opprobrium of medical science. In other places he indicates the important bearing of his favourite science, mathematics, on various branches of political and economical philosophy. The merit in all these cases consists in the first germinant thought (evincing the active and inventive quality of his mind), rather than in the exact application or full development of it. We may say of such proofs of sagacity, as Sir James Mackintosh said of Horne Tooke's theory, the beauty was in the original conception, rather than the accuracy with which it was applied.' But it is in these prophetic glimpses of great truths, in almost every department of science,— truths which it was left for after ages fully to evolve and establish,-that this great man entitled himself to a place with almost all the very greatest mindswith Aristotle, with Bacon and with Newton-in all of whom the same quality was remarkably exemplified. It is given to such minds alone to predict and foreshadow the coming dispensations of philosophy; to catch from the mountain heights of their contemplations (if we may modify a thought which has occurred to more than one writer) the first radiance of the rising sun, when to the rest of this world's inhabitants he is still below the horizon."-Pp. 19, 20.

The third article is an amusing and clever description of the Long Parliament and Sir Simond D'Ewes, the materials for which have been derived partly from the autobiography of that entertaining pedant, who thought "records the most ravishing and satisfying part of human knowledge," and partly from Sir Simond's Journal of the Parliament, which still lies buried in the British Museum in an almost illegible manuscript. There are two very readable articles on "Borneo and the Indian Archipelago," and on some recent works on "Spain and the Spaniards." Art. 8, is a judicious and well-timed article on "Mysticism and Scepticism," which, without being either original or profound, is judicious and instructive. With calm precision, the writer aims some heavy blows against the various extreme parties that now trouble the religious world, including the unreasoning Evangelical, the much-reasoning Anglo-Catholic, and the mystifying Rationalist. Like Baden Powell, he detects affinities and resemblances in all these extreme schools, and shews the

sympathy that exists between the implicit faith of Mr. Newman and the scepticism of the Anglo-German mystic. The article deserves the careful perusal of all, especially of those disciples of the Destructive school in our own body, who have been taught to rely as the basis of their faith, not on external evidence, but on internal conviction. We heartily agree with the reviewer that the circumstances of the times force into vital importance "the great question of the Christian evidences." He very truly observes, that, "when, as at present, Mysticism and Scepticism are undistinguishable in outward aspect, and when transcendental orthodoxy and utter disbelief have learned to speak the same language, it becomes the more necessary to strip them of their disguises, and expose the naked deformities of each; as well as to vindicate the just claims of sober and rational inquiry into the evidences, which alone secures them their proper force and authority."-P. 222.

In the pages of this Magazine we have freely and fearlessly spoken what we thought of the writings of Mr. Emerson, who appears to be in this country the pet writer of the Mystics. Our criticisms called forth the anger of one and the scorn of another. But these things we ever value at their true worth, and heed them not when the interests of truth and pure religion are at stake. The reviewer's estimate of Mr. Emerson as a thinker and a writer will not be more acceptable to his admirers than our own.

"Extremes often meet in a very singular manner: the very same mystical chimeras are engendered equally in the cold recesses of academical cloisters, and in the heated atmospheres of certain lecture-rooms. A system in which the abstractions of reason are the avowed objects of contemplation, is sometimes strangely made to run into the wildest hallucinations of mystical reverie; the very counterpart of that we have already exposed as the prevalent tendency of the Catholic school."-P. 208.

The reviewer then, as a specimen of this style of theologizing, quotes some passages from Mr. Emerson's Address to the Harvard Students, which, though mystical enough, possess nothing of the infidel tone so often found in his later Essays." At the end of the quotations, the reviewer remarks,

66

"In such a rhapsody, it is little to the purpose where we begin or leave off; but the above will, we suppose, suffice. The reader, however, will not fail to be struck with the parallel so manifestly presented between many of these ideas and the doctrines of Catholicism, respecting the perpetual supernaturality of the Church, the continuance of Divine teaching, and the same reference to religion embodied in the architecture and other artistical adjuncts of ecclesiastical pageantries. Thus systems, professedly, of so opposite a character, are identified in the practical results of an unintelligible chaos of visionary notions, in which the spirit of sentimental devotion loves to lose itself, and into which all substantial ideas of definite belief are sublimed and lost."-P. 209.

The British Quarterly Review, No. VII.-This No. (the best of the series) contains three biographical articles, admirably written and full of thought, the subjects of which are Blanco White, Wollaston and John Foster. We would specify the last of these as particularly excellent. Its praise is characterized by judicious discrimination, and the contrast of Foster with Robert Hall is very felicitous. We should be glad to justify our praise by extracts, but must content ourselves with recommending our readers to study the article, which we imagine to be from the pen of the Editor, Dr. Vaughan. The review of the Life of Blanco White comes late. By an unfortunate misprint in the title of the article, it is ascribed to Rev. J. H. Thorn. Agreeing as we do with many of the writer's remarks on the character and tendency of Mr. White's later opinions, we could have wished to see a somewhat larger measure of charity towards, if not of sympathy with, him. There were noble elements both in his moral and intellectual character, to which this reviewer has scarcely done justice. Had he appreciated Mr. White's great tenderness of affection towards his friends, he would scarcely have complained, as he does, of the autobiographer's uttering "a great deal of cant about the