OUR CHRISTIAN CLASSICS. 3 then, we trust that we can distinguish between the playfulness of affection and the flippancy of irreverent familiarity. With this last we should be grieved, indeed, to find ourselves in any instance justly chargeable. Of the seriousness which springs from profound conviction, our world has always contained too little. At the same time, of cheerfulness, as contradistinguished from frivolity, there has been no single source so productive as the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Perhaps this may be one use of the following series. Just as it ought to make Christians catholic, by exhibiting the same spiritual identity in many outward communions, so it should make us magnanimous by revealing love to the same Saviour, under every possible natural temperament and mental complexion. Within the limits of essential truth and unquestioned piety, ought we not to cherish a large and generous spirit? Amongst the first disciples of our Lord there was a great diversity of mental and moral contour; but, for their various attributes and dispositions,-for the caution of Thomas, and for the prompt intuition of the guileless Nathanael; for the faith of Stephen, with its historical basis, and for the spiritual consciousness of John; for James with his blunt directness, and for Paul with his delicate dexterity; for Peter so tender, no less than for Jude so faithful and severe,-He found a place in His heart and a function in His Church, and, attached to one Head and quickened by one Spirit, of these many members He made one strong and beautiful body. Should we not try to understand the principle which lay at the root of the Saviour's catholicity? and must it endanger our loyalty to Himself if we cultivate a cordial attachment to all classes of His disciples? A lover of art may have his own predilections; but it is a sickly or one-sided taste which can tolerate one style only, and which hangs its exclusive walls with the productions of a single master. To a healthful eye there is a several charm in the sunny landscape of Claude and the savage chaos of Salvator; in the feminine saintliness of Murillo and the Titanic majesty of Michael Angelo; in the creations of Fra Angelica, so immaterial and seraphic, and in the canvas of Rubens, bursting with passion and exuberant with animal energy; nor will a complacent glance be refused to the merry groups of Teniers, and the exquisite imitations of Van Huysum. For our own picture gallery we claim a similar latitude. We desire to introduce nothing that is absolutely worthless, but we should like to give a fair representation of the great masters in English theology. Some will prefer the ethereal abstractions of Howe to the homely wisdom of Henry, and the experimental opulence of Owen to the poetic profusion of Jeremy Taylor. Alongside of Hugh Latimer's liveliness many will regard, as more suited to his sacred theme, the tense solemnity of Richard Baxter; and, rather than Whitfield's declamatory fervour, others will enjoy the precise statements of Edwards, and the accurate logic of Butler. But those who remember the source from which comes every good and perfect gift, and the cause to which every Christian excellence is consecrated, whilst they wander enchanted through the imagery of the "Golden Grove," or sit spell-bound before the visions of the Bedford Dreamer, will not disdain a quaint emblem of Francis Quarles, or a pithy saying of Thomas Fuller. ANGLO-SAXON PERIOD. WHEN the Romans left Britain, Christianity was generally professed throughout the district which had been under their dominion, and the Gospel could shew its conquests in places to which the legions had never penetrated. It is true that the annals of the Romano-British Church are neither very copious nor very brilliant. Except Alban the martyr, who is more than counterbalanced by Pelagius the heretic, its archives preserve few names of renown; and it is too likely that the purer faith was tinctured with a superstitious infusion from the aboriginal Druidism. Still the Gospel, and Italian culture together, had done much to refine and elevate the native race; and when, early in the fifth century, the Romans withdrew, Christianity might be deemed the national religion. In the last galley which then quitted these shores, should there have been a 66 good centurion," he may have comforted himself with thinking, that if the eagles had retreated from the land of Caractacus, the Cross was now standing in their stead; and he may have been glad to remember, that since the mighty Julius first scaled them, the Sun of Righteousness had arisen on the white cliffs of Albion. But at the end of the sixth century the scene was entirely changed. During the interval, there had poured into this island vast hordes of Saxons, Jutes, and Angles. These invaders were different branches of one great Teutonic family, who, in the marshes and pine forests of Northern Germany, had retained unsoftened their fierce independence and savage paganism. A strong and muscular race, with fair hair and florid, clear complexions, they were full of redundant energy; and it was their great delight to do battle by turns with the boar of the forest and the sleety tempests of the Northern Ocean. Sometimes driven by hunger, and sometimes by the lust of plunder, and not unfrequently impelled by the spirit of adventure-the "love of noble game," they would put to sea in the depth of winter; and at the moment when the season of the year and the boisterous weather gave a double sense of security, their unsuspecting neighbours would be horrified when, all of a sudden, they discovered the "White Horse careering over watery hills, or plunging ashore through the shallows. It was seldom that any effectual resistance could be offered, and too frequently there was not even time to escape. The fugitives only returned to find their homesteads in flames, and to watch, as they disappeared in the eastern horizon, the ships freighted with their goods, and which were carrying off their children to slavery. Before the end of the sixth century, these bold pirates from Jutland and Friesland had complete possession of South Britain. Cornwall and Wales continued independent; the Lowlands, however, were not only thoroughly conquered, but, as the result of successive slaughter and oppression, the natives seem nearly to have disappeared. † And along with them vanished Christianity. In Bangor, and other sacred retreats which were still beyond the reach of the idolater, the believing Briton found a congenial asylum; but throughout the conquered territory the Gospel had yielded to the adoration of the Sun and Moon, of Odin, Thor, and Freya-mingled, in some instances, with a revival of the aboriginal Druidism. So that, before the year 597, the fair country which we now call England, from the Severn to the sea, may be regarded as once more entirely pagan. It was in that year that missionaries from a far country arrived on our heathen shores. It would seem that, one day, *The Saxon Standard. + Hallam's Middle Ages (10th ed.), vol. ii., pp. 274, 369. SLAVE-MARKET AT ROME. a kind-hearted ecclesiastic was passing through the slavemarket at Rome, when his attention was arrested by three youths whom a trader was offering for sale. Their bright hair and beautiful complexion, unless they had been in dreams, were new to Gregory, and their flowing locks betokened noble birth. "What youths are these?" was the exclamation of the astonished ecclesiastic. "Angles," replied the merchant. "Not Angles, but Angels!" was the rejoinder of the monk, according to the punning fashion popular in his day and amongst his order. "Are they Christians?" "No; they are heathens." "Alas, alas! that such beauty should belong to the Prince of Darkness, and that in forms so fair should dwell souls which the Spirit of God has never visited. What do you call the province from which they come?" Deira." "And from the ire of God they must be brought over into the grace of Christ. And their king, how call ye him?" "Ella." "Surely! for Alleluias must be chanted in his realm.' And could the warmhearted churchman have got his way, he would have proceeded at once to Britain. In this purpose he was hindered; but when he found himself Bishop of Rome he remembered the "angelic" 66 " * An incident which the dexterous muse of Wordsworth has woven into graceful numbers : "A bright-haired company of youthful slaves, Beautiful strangers, stand within the pale His wing who could seem lovelier to man's eye Who, having learnt that name, salvation craves Of chiming sound, commanding sympathies; Glad Halle-lujahs to the eternal King." Ecclesiastical Sonnets. |