cordingly, the Professor endeavours
to establish the fact by induction; a
mode of reasoning, which, in many
instances, is perfectly legitimate, and
which is here pursued with consider-
able ingenuity and force. From se-
veral particular propositions he de-
duces that general proposition which
he sets out with enuntiating: by
steps he arrives at the final conclu-
sion, that the Hebrew canon in the
time of our Saviour was the same
Hebrew canon, which is now repre-
sented by our Hebrew Bibles; and
that we have his sanction for every
canonical book of the Old Testament.
For this purpose, the learned Pre-
late attempts to connect the catalogue
of the Hebrew Scriptures, which Je-
rom has given in his Prologus gale-
atus, with the account which Jose-
phus has given of those Scriptures,
in his treatise against Apion. Jerom,
like Josephus, divides them into three
classes, which he calls, the Law, the
Prophets, and the Hagiographa. He
has further enumerated the several
books of which each class consisted:
and it appears from this enumeration,
that the books which were then con-
tained in the Hebrew Bible, were the
same books which are now contained
in it. In regard to the first class,
or the Pentateuch, the enumeration
made respectively by Josephus and by
Jerom, is, beyond dispute, the same.
The only difficulty which attends the
comparison of their accounts, is that
which relates to the two other classes.
Yet, if we take those two classes to-
gether, both writers agree as to the
total number of the books comprised
in them and the sole difference con-
sists in the partition* of the books
between the two classes. Now, as
we know that the Jews have been
gradually augmenting the number of
books in the third class, by a pro-
portionate diminution of the number
in the second, we need not wonder
if the third class, which in the first
century contained only four books,
contained nine at the end of the fourth
century, and that the books of the
second class had been proportionally
reduced from thirteen to eight. Jo-

We employ this word, in preference to Bishop M.'s repartition, which is a French, and not an English, noun.

sephus himself, in a well-known passage of his treatise against Apion, though he has not enumerated the seventeen books which composed the two last classes, has given a description of those books; and this description exactly corresponds with the inference deduced from a comparison of his account with Jerom's. To the third class the book of Proverbs, and the book of Ecclesiastes, as well as the book of Psalms, have been referred by the Jews of every age: to the same class Jerom, in his catalogue of the Hebrew Scriptures, has referred the book of Job and Solomon's Song; though it be probable that by Josephus they were somewhat differently arranged. Nor is it a solid objection against the accuracy of this reasoning, that later Jews have referred to the third class various books, which are here referred to the second class of Josephus; the removal of such books from the class in which they were originally placed being well explained by history.

The Margaret Professor's conclusions are, that the Hebrew Scriptures which received the sanction of our Saviour were the same Hebrew Scriptures which were known to Josephus; that they contained the same books which were enumerated by Jerom, and still constitute our Hebrew Bibles; and that the authority of the Old Testament, according to the canon of the English church, though not according to the canon of the church of Rome, rests upon a basis which cannot be shaken. We recommend his argument to the careful attention of students in theology and in logic. (31-50.)

Of his thirty-fourth lecture the object is to establish the integrity of the Hebrew Bible, to shew that the books which compose it have descended to the present age without material alteration. With this view, he divides his inquiries into two periods; the one extending from the time of Moses to that of our Saviour, the other extending from the time of our Saviour to this day. Here he makes a very fair and judicious use of several historical facts: nor, in any part of his reasoning, is he more successful than in his proofs that the Jews have not wilfully corrupted their Scriptures. As a specimen of his manner

of arguing, two extracts shall be laid before our readers :

"The authentic books of Ezra and Nehemiah afford us no reason to sup

pose, that the law of Moses had been so destroyed, as is represented in that apocryphal book, called the second book of Esdras (xiv. 21). From the eighth chapter of Nehemiah it is evident, that the book of the law (whether the Templecopy or not) was preserved during the period of the Babylonish Captivity. For when the worship of God was restored at Jerusalem, they spake unto Ezra the scribe, to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had commanded to Israel. Aud Ezra the priest brought the law before the congregation.' Nehemiah viii. 1, 2. The prophet Daniel must also have had a copy of the law, for he appealed to it, and quoted it. Daniel ix. 13."-Pp. 57, 58.

66 the charge of corrupting the Hebrew Scriptures, though it has been repeated in modern times, had its origin in the ignorance of those who introduced it. The Greek and Latin Fathers were for the most part unacquainted with Hebrew, though Origen and Jerom were illustrious exceptions. The Greek Fa thers quoted from the Septuagint; the Latin Fathers from the Latin version, which was made from the Septuagint. They had no Latin translation from the

Hebrew till the time of Jerom: and even kis translation was not immediately adopted as the authorised version of the

Latin church."-P. 64.

Even theological students, who are of considerable standing, may read with great pleasure and advantage this part of Bishop Marsh's lectures. To young men who are preparing themselves for the exercise of the Christian ministry it will be especially and highly useful. At the same time, it has obvious defects. Of these not the least is the arrangement. The order and the method of proof which a well-informed Jew would pursue in laying before the world the evidences of the authority of his sacred books, are what the Margaret Professor ought, on every account, to have preferred. Another glaring imperfection (we have formerly complained of it), is the extreme scantiness of reference to "the principal authors" on this branch of divinity. How strange that, in the pulpit of the University of Cambridge, the Right

1

Reverend Prelate should be silent concerning Sir Isaac Newton,* H. Owen, Graves, &c., the arguments of some others he impugns! He will not do of whom he adopts, while those of justice to his subject and to himself, unless, in a subsequent part, he treat of the Hebrew Scriptures in detail.

Generally speaking, his style is pure as well as clear. In p. 65, however, he uses the word operate in an unwarrantable, that is in a transitive signification.

ART. II.-The Claims of the Clergy to Tithes and other Church Revenues, so far as they are founded on the Political Expediency of supporting such a Body; on Divine Right; on History; or on the Notion of Unalienable Property, examined. 8vo. pp. 40. Liverpool printed; sold by Hunter, &c., London. 1823.

Tuess is becoming every year HE question of "Church Revemore interesting, and it is extremely desirable that the public should be in possession of full information upon the subject. The author of this pamphlet has done his part towards this great object, under the persuasion that how much soever the fear of change, attachment to custom, respect for individuals and motives of personal interest may retard the progress of opinion, truth, justice and public good will finally prevail, and it must be honourable to be, in whatever degree, an instrument in promoting them. (P. 40.)

The subject is treated in this pamphlet under the four heads of-The expediency of a publicly endowed clergy; the divine right of tithes; the history of Christian tithes; and the right to tithes as being the property of the church. These are argued ably, and boldly argued, and the writer's conclusions are, that an established church is unnecessary, unchristian, and of injurious influence; that the claim of tithes universally, as by divine right, is the imposition of priestcraft on ignorance and superstition; that the history of the Christian Church proves that tithes belong, if to any

On the Prophecies, Part I. Ch. i.

body, to the poor; and that the present right of the clergy in tithes is created, and may be destroyed by an act of the Legislature.

Some remarks are made in the pamphlet on the publications of "the Rev. Aug. Campbell, Rector of Wallasey, the champion of tithes," and trusting, as we confidently do, in the quotations here made, we cannot but be surprised at the frankness and courage of that divine. He is said to have called on the Gentlemen of England, in a recent work addressed to them,* (p. 26,) to support tithes for the purpose of keeping sixteen or seventeen millions of RAGAMUFFINS in order, by the awful terrors of an invisible world." Again, this Christian minister is represented (p. 39 of this pamphlet, Note,) as saying in his Appeal, P. 15, "It is for their dinners that I wish to interest some of the Gentlemen of England: when the people have emancipated themselves from the tyranny of the priests, is it to be supposed that they will submit to the tyranny of the game-laws?" Campbell is right: tithes and gamelaws stand on the same ground, that ground not justice; and when the people have rid themselves of one of these abuses of power, they will not be very patient under the other.

Mr.

Our anonymous author (known, however, to us, and not unknown, under his real name to the religious public) thus satisfactorily disposes of one of this plain-spoken clergyman's arguments for church-property :

"That zealous advocate of tithes, the Bev. Augustus Campbell, in his Appeal to the Gentlemen of England,' seems disposed to rest the right to tithes as property on the gift of King Ethelwulph; but in a previous pamphlet (The Rights of the English Clergy asserted') he seems to prefer resting it on the gifts of individuals in later times: as an example he brings forward the case of his own parish, Wallasey, in the county of Chester, which he says was endowed by a certain William de Walley, before the year 1182, with the tithe and glebe, and he wishes to know what possible right the people can have to what an ancient owner gave to the church? According, however, to

· "Appeal to the Gentlemen of England in behalf of the Church of England."

The

his own acknowledgment, this owner and
all others (or rather their tenants) were at
that time obliged by law and custom to pay
tithes, though they might then pay them
that William de Walley only provided for
to what religious house they pleased; so
the tithes he could not help paying, being
made useful to his own estate.
glebe fields only he gave freely out of his
own property to the church. This glebe,
and all other church lauds which have
been given by their owners in former
times, certainly do not belong to the de-
scendants of those owners; but before
we decide that they do belong to the
present clergy, beyond the just controul
of the Legislature, we must consider a

little the nature of the gift. The owners gave these lands, as any other lands are left in charity, for certain special purposes. Now amongst these purposes was the support of the poor; for the lands were all given before the support of the poor out of the parochial income had ceased: and farther, these lands were given with an immediate view to the support of the ceremonies and worship of the corrupt Catholic Church of the dark ages, on the performance of which the givers relied for salvation; and, therefore, since neither the poor are now sharers, nor deemed necessary, the present holders are the rites performed which the givers cannot certainly found their right on the original gift. All the lands of the church were given to the Roman Catholic Church, and the kind of right by which they are now held is, that that church ceasing to be the religion of the country, and being discountenanced by the Legislature, its forfeited possessions were given by Parliament, that is, by the public, to the present establishment; and the same publie may differently appropriate them by the same right whenever it shall seem expedient. Church lands are precisely in the same situation with estates left for a charitable purpose which would now be thought absurd, or cannot be fulfilled, and which estates are, therefore, applied to some other useful purpose, to be determined by the proper authorities: nor can any one doubt, but that in such a case as that now before us, the only right authority is vested in Parliament. Whatever right, either to tithes or estates, is founded on their being the gifts of individuals, is unsatisfactory; because the gifts are not employed as originally intended, and because the public have already interfered to alter their destination; so that the present Church of England holds its property merely by act of Parliament, and it is no more secure from reformation or abolition by the public will, than any other of the public

institutions of the country: it has no pretensions whatever to a right similar to that of private property; and the cry against the violation of property raised, whenever its reformation is proposed, is no more than the cant of an interested party."-Pp. 31–33.

TH

ART. III-Zeal for the Revival and
Diffusion of Pure Christian Truth,
a Duty arising from Belief in its
Divine Authority. A Sermon,
preached at the Unitarian Chapel,
in Parliament Court, Artillery
Lane, London, on Wednesday, May
21, 1823, before the Supporters and
Friends of the Unitarian Fund.
By Henry Acton. 12mo. pp. 32.
Hunter; Eaton; and Fox and Co.
HIS is an able and judicious
argumentative discourse. The
proposition which forms its title is
deduced from 1 Thess. ii. 13, and is
amplified in the following remarks:
"I. That since Christian truth is the
word of God, the more nearly that it
shall be professed in its genuine pu-
rity, the greater, we are bound to
believe, will be its efficacy in answer-
ing the important purposes of Divine
Providence." "2. Christian truth,
being the word of God, is undoubtedly
of infinite value to all mankind, and
essentially conducive to their highest
moral improvement and happiness."
"3. From our conviction that Chris-
tian truth is the word of God, we have
good reason to anticipate its general
diffusion in the world." "4. Per-
suaded that Christian truth is the word
of God, we must hold ourselves bound
to receive it as a sacred trust, com-
mitted to us not for our own benefit
only, but that we may do all in our
power to dispense its heavenly truths
abroad."

Under the second head, the preacher thus vindicates "the efficacy of the simple doctrines of the gospel :"

"Our particular views, indeed, have been commonly denounced by our Trinitarian brethren as being wholly deficient in moral value, especially because they make us acquainted with no atonement for the supposed original and infinite guilt of our fallen nature, without which atonement, it is said, we can have no sure hope of the mercy and favour of God. But this is plainly nothing less than to raise an objection to our views upon a gratuitous assumption of the truth

of their own; for unless the most untenable and gloomy doctrines of orthodoxy be first admitted as true, such an atonement was never needed by man, nor could have been accepted by God. It is little better than sophistry, therefore, to charge our representation of Christianity with being defective, because it contains no remedy for an evil which, if this repre sensation be correct, never existed. The truth, we humbly presume, is, that our brethren, by their misinterpretation of the Sacred Writings, first plunge the whole human race into an imaginary abyss of guilt and woe; and next, by further misinterpretation, discover an imaginary method of delivering some few out of this abyss, which they then call upon us to admire as a peculiar excellence of their system. They first, by their own vain imaginings, cast over the whole face of human existence a thick darkness, which shuts out every ray of hope from the bosom of man, and then reproach us that we have no doctrine purposely revealed to dispel the withering gloom which they themselves have created. But for every moral and spiritual want with which man really becomes acquainted from nature or from revelation, assuredly Unitarian Christianity affords a sweet and abundant supply. To the penitent sinner it poiuts out a sure way by which he may attain to the forgiveness and favour of God, and this in a path expressly consecrated for the purpose by the mercy of Heaven, even in the broad way of repentance and reformation. To them that be slow to the practice of virtue and piety, it brings all the pleasing and all the awful motives to righteousuess, arising from the great themes of future judgment, eternity and the Divine favour.

To the mourning children of affliction it affords an inexhaustible fountain of consolation and peace, by giving them faith in the constant providence of a heavenly Father, whose dispensations are all mercy and truth. To them whose eyes are closing in the darkness of death, it reveals the light of life and immorta lity. And if men have been brought to suppose that they need any thing of religion further than this, they are misled by false views of their own condition, or of the character and government of God." Pp. 17, 18.

In the following passage, Mr. Acton makes an animated appeal to the experience of the church, in confirmation of his third remark :

"And has not Christianity, in the triumphs which it has already effected, given us a glorious pledge of its future conquests? The Heathen are fast be