ciously clung to the eldest and most dangerous vice of the human mind, i. e. a tendency to claim to itself the credit of blessings which have been wholly supplied by the Father of lights from whom cometh every good and perfect gift. On no subject has more credit been claimed for philosophy than on that of the soul's continued existence. We have seen that in the earlier accounts of the Hebrews which have come down to us, it was a part of the method of Divine teaching, to require implicit repose on His boundless goodness for the entire future being of the objects of it. Yet to those who had attained this confidence an assurance of some glorious future was vouchsafed, which was not the less connected with a 66 fulness of joy," because it was indefinite as to its mode. And with all the eloquent things which were said on this subject by the Greeks and some of the Romans, all which they could say beyond this indefinite hope, or, if you please, inherent belief, was either to becloud it with dreary fancies, or to make it incredible by wild speculations-the effect of both which was to increase the doubts respecting the doctrine itself; and there is much to shew that these Epicurean doubts had not only deeply infected the heathen world at the time of our Lord's appearance, but with the prevalence of Greek ideas in Palestine, had pro who were almost persuaded to be Christians, but who were deterred by the remaining oblo.quy and disabilities which were still allowed to test the sincerity, and to stimulate the zeal of its genuine disciples. It is not for us to say what amount of spiritual benefit had been derived by those who from the earliest times of heathen philosophy had received the light of revealed truth in increasing measure, till heathenism was utterly outshone and extinguished by the power of its beams. It is too evident, from what has come before us in this inquiry, that though this truth had reached the understandings of men, it had in most cases only afforded them materials for speculation, and had seldom been received with any approach to the obedience of faith. The spiritual necessities of men had been forced upon their attention, but the true means of supplying them were either unperceived or indignantly rejected. Above all, the great idea which is exhibited in all the Scriptures, less clearly in the Old Testament, but fully and gloriously developed in the New Covenant, of the mode of acceptance with God, is perhaps nowhere found in heathen philosophy; and that “Articulum stantis vel cadentis Ecclesiæ," which has been too loosely held in Christendom itself, has always been the last to recommend itself to the spirit of a philosophy which has ever most tena ciously clung to the eldest and most dangerous vice of the human mind, i. e. a tendency to claim to itself the credit of blessings which have been wholly supplied by the Father of lights from whom cometh every good and perfect gift. On no subject has more credit been claimed for philosophy than on that of the soul's continued existence. We have seen that in the earlier accounts of the Hebrews which have come down to us, it was a part of the method of Divine teaching, to require implicit repose on His boundless goodness for the entire future being of the objects of it. Yet to those who had attained this confidence an assurance of some glorious future was vouchsafed, which was not the less connected with a 66 fulness of joy," because it was indefinite as to its mode. And with all the eloquent things which were said on this subject by the Greeks and some of the Romans, all which they could say beyond this indefinite hope, or, if you please, inherent belief, was either to becloud it with dreary fancies, or to make it incredible by wild speculations-the effect of both which was to increase the doubts respecting the doctrine itself; and there is much to shew that these Epicurean doubts had not only deeply infected the heathen world at the time of our Lord's appearance, but with the prevalence of Greek ideas in Palestine, had pro duced the Sadducean heresy among the Jews: while that part of the people who faithfully adhered to their Sacred Scriptures as a Acts xxiv. whole, maintained, as St. Paul asserted, "the hope in God that there should be a resurrection both of the just and unjust." 15. De usu We are not to wonder that this developement of the Hebrew doctrines was a new stumbling-block in the way of human reason. Galen had declared it impossible that God could create man out of the dust of the Earth. How many more difficulties seemed to be in the way of the resurrection of the dead! Yet this doctrine was a corner-stone of Christianity. A still greater stumbling-block was the doctrine of the Cross. But this too was declared to be the power of God and the wisdom of God. It seemed as if by these philosophy was at length to be driven to despair. All compromise with it was at an end. These doctrines could never appear to spring from human theories. They rested absolutely on Divine authority. They were proclaimed to men "with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven." Henceforth, philosophy-by stumbling at the doctrines of heaven, was destined to be "broken,”-by throwing itself in their way, to be "ground to powder." That so "our faith and hope might be in God." APPENDIX. ON THE PRESENT STATE OF RELIGION IN GERMANY. IN N the Studien und Kritiken for 1848, Dr Hundeshagen, Christian Advocate in the University of Heidelberg, has the following remarks: "The first age of the Christian Church is rightly called the apologetic, for the Christian religion had then to win its right to existence by its struggles. We of this age are in this respect carried back to the commencement of Christianity, for the fore-front of the battle of parties relates to the very existence of the Christian religion. "Who has not heard in all directions voices exclaiming in this way: The so-called facts on which Christianity rests are mere fictions of the fancy, creations of human consciousness, which are now recognized by the mind as such, and as merely such recalled. Christ is a myth, which the understanding under certain historical circumstances projected, as Isis and Artemis.' Or even this: 'Religion in general is an illusion, though an inevitable one, as long as reason has not attained in its developement to full acquaintance with its own powers.' "God is only the being of the human spirit itself, viewed by itself separately. Our relation to God is the relation of a man to himself, but regarded as another.' "If we consider that these, and similar assertions, are not mere wanton frivolities, but are brought for |