As might be expected from the above, the author finds the Psalms pervaded by the Messianic element. Not only do the deepest sufferings and serenest joys culminate in the Messiah, referring in all cases to Him as the archetype, but there are also in abundance literal, direct, as well as typical, Messianic prophecies. As an instance of direct Messianic prophecy, he adduces Psalm xvi. 15,— For thou wilt not leave my soul to Sheol, which, if correctly translated, would not admit of such an hypothesis. (See Perowne, ad loc.) We are always sorry to find the advocates of a good cause making use of bad arguments. The imprecatory Psalms are regarded as the utterance of a king in his public capacity, as God's vicegerent, and as believing in the law of retribution, which is justified by the times in which the authors lived and the circumstances in which they were placed. Dr. Murphy brings the 105th Psalm under the same category, and he neither suggests nor feels the necessity of another solution of the difficulty. We have dwelt at length on the author's principle and standpoint, because they decide, in a great measure, the character of the interpretation itself. The Commentary contains a revision of the Authorized Version, which is intended to abbreviate the comment and to exhibit the inner connection of the text. The version and comment are preceded by a brief reference to the occasion, subject, and arrangement of the Psalms, and are followed by critical notes, which are very few, and generally unimportant. The translation is often unsatisfactory, and the comments are little more than such reflections as one not unfrequently hears in pulpit expositions. We must content ourselves with a few specimens, selected at random. Psalm ii. 12: Kiss ye purely, lest he be angry, and ye lose the way; Happy all who trust in him.' We agree with his rendering of bar; but why not translate ‘pay,' 'pure,' 'homage' as Symmachus, Jerome, and others? e.g., πpooкvvitatε кałaρws, Adorate pure. Why translate tobedu derec by the curious expression, 'lose 'the way,' especially since he translates the same word 'perish' in Psalm i. 6? It is both obscure and incorrect. When we came to the reading, ' in a little,' we were at a loss to know why he should have so rendered the Hebrew word, and what the exact meaning of it could be. Upon turning to the commentary we find that it means the space of time extending from the poet's time to the day of final judgment, or, perhaps, the space of human life. We give the note in full:- The longest life is 'but a span, a tale, a breath, and after that the judgment. Then the ob'durate foe of God and godliness awaits the doom, Depart from me, ye 'cursed. See also Psalm vii. 4: 'If I have requited my friend with evil, where he explains that to deliver with emptiness' is to fail to deliver. Add to the above Psalms viii. 5, xvi. 1-3, &c. We cannot conclude, however, without referring to the excellences of the work, which are very numerous and important. While we cannot recommend it to the critical student, we can honestly do so to the general reader, who wishes to find within a reasonable compass all that is necessary for an intelligent and useful study of the Psalms. He will scarcely ever be disappointed in his search into the meaning of a passage, and will always be gratified with the reverential spirit in which the author deals with Divine truth. It is infinitely superior to the majority of works having a similar aim and character. Critical and Exegetical Handbook to the Gospel of John. By HEINRICH AUGUST WILHELM MEYER, Th.D. Translated from the Fifth Edition of the German. The Translation Revised and Edited by FREDERICK CROMBIE, D.D., St. Andrew's. Vol. II. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark. Critical and Exegetical Handbook to the Epistles to the Philippians and Colossians. Translated from the Fourth Edition of the German by the Rev. JOHN C. MOORE, B.A. The Translation Revised and Edited by WILLIAM P. DICKSON, D.D., Glasgow. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark. Messrs. Clark steadily, although necessarily at irregular intervals, continue their translations of Meyer's great work, which is simply of inestimable value to students of the Original Text unable to make use of Meyer's German. The Gospel of John is now completed; the translations up to chapter xi. are by Mr. Urwick and Dr. W. D. Simon, the subsequent chapters by the Rev. Edwin Johnson, the whole being carefully revised by Professor Crombie, whose references to Dr. Moulton's translation of Winer's 'Grammar of New Testament Greek,' and to Professor Thayer's translation of Buttman's Grammar,' add a very important element of value. Dr. Meyer had just completed a careful revision of the second of the above volumes when he died. The first half of the manuscript had been sent to the printer's, the second half was found labelled 'ready for the press.' These emendations are contained in the fourth edition, from which this translation is made, although a translation of the third edition, by the late Mr. G. H. Venables, had been completed. To each of these volumes a very valuable bibliographical list of exegetical works is prefixed, including, of course, English expositors. For obvious reasons, criticism of Professor Meyer's work would be preposterous here: we necessarily restrict ourselves to an intimation of the progress of these translations, and to a general commendation of the great and scholarly care with which they are made. Chips from a German Workshop. By F. MAX MÜLLER, M.A., If any find this fourth volume of Professor Müller's 'Chips from 'a German Workshop' less varied or less interesting than its predecessors, the explanation is not far to seek. The writer is no longer a stranger among us; he has delivered his specific message in many forms and ways, and it has become familiar to his numerous students and readers. The writer, like the preacher, may bring forth out of his treasure-house things new and old; but the time must come when he will have exhausted what is individual and distinctive; and though thero may be variations in manner in what he afterwards produces, there will be substantial identity of matter. This has been the case with all our great writers with none more so than Mr. Carlyle, who has given us no new theory or doctrine since he wrote 'Sartor Resartus-and we need not be surprised if it is the same with Mr. Müller. He has done a great work in England by the light he has thrown upon the leading principles of the Science of Language. He has indicated rich treasures as lying still concealed in Comparative Philology and Comparative Theology, and has thereby opened a new field of investigation, in which there is ample room for many inquirers. He has not given us a new philosophy, but he has shown in what direction we must work if we are to attain one that will prove satisfactory and adequate. Holding fast the great truth of man's spirituality, and therefore his essential difference from the merely animal creation, Mr. Müller has interposed strong barriers in the way of the materialism of the modern theorists of development. If, in this fourth volume, he does not go beyond what he has given us in previous works, he yet illustrates his positions in ever new and graceful fashions, and presents us with essays written in pure English, which it is a pleasure to read. In this fourth volume we have the inaugural lecture delivered by Professor Müller in 1868, on the value of Comparative Philology as a branch of academic study. As we write, we regret to observe that he has intimated his resignation of the Chair he then inaugurated, and it will not be easy to supply his place; for there are few scholars who unite with scholarly acquirements the comprehensive philosophical spirit and culture distinctive of Mr. Müller. The Rede Lecture, on the Stratification of Language, the essay on the Migration of Fables, the Lecture on the Results of Comparative Philology, delivered with so much patriotic exultation at Strasburg, and the address on the importance of Oriental Studies, are all on the lines with which readers of the author's former works are familiar. Of another order is the lecture on Missions, delivered two years ago in Westminster Abbey, which excited much controversy at the time of its delivery. In this volume it is illustrated by important additional notes, and along with it are printed a postscript 'On the Vitality of Brahman'ism,' and Dean Stanley's Introductory Sermon on Christian Missions. We do not share all Mr. Müller's opinions regarding the scope and objects of Christian missions; but where he errs, it is, as seems to us, chiefly by defect. We can accept nearly all that is positive in his teaching, though we think it requires to be further supplemented. But Professor Müller is doing such good work by the stand he has made in the interest of truth-of the interpretation of the undeniable facts of human life-against Materialism in its evolutionary phase, that we have little relish for hostile criticism of anything he does. We cordially welcome him as an ally in the great fight against a blank Atheism and a degrading Materialism, which threaten to come in upon us like a flood, eliminating all intellectual nobility from man and darkening and debasing the human conscience. In the Reply to Mr. Darwin,' and in the concluding paper of the volume, entitled In Self-Defence,' the Evolutionists are attacked both from the ground of philosophy and science in a manner that leaves little to be desired. The calmness and earnestness of the searcher after truth rarely desert Mr. Müller, even when he is replying to assailants skilled in the use of poisoned weapons. His philosophical breadth of view is combined with a ripe scholarship of the most varied order; and he is able to add the attractiveness of a skilled literary artist in his expositions and arguments. We very heartily commend the fourth volume of these 'Chips' to the thoughtful reader, who will find in them an antidote to much that is misleading in the scientific spirit of the times. The Dialogues of Plato, Translated into English, with Analysis and Introductions. By B. JOWETT, M.A., Master of Balliol College. Second Edition. Revised and Corrected throughout. Clarendon Press. In a former review of this work we took occasion to notice in detail some instances of laxity, not to say of inaccuracy, in the rendering of the Greek, and the general tendency to paraphrase rather than to translate; and we noticed that these faults seemed to prevail in some of the Dialogues more than in others. In the preface to the second edition the author, perhaps intending a reply to the objections of critics, has explained somewhat fully his ideas as to what a good English translation of Plato should really be. He holds that it should read as an original 'work, and should also be the most faithful transcript which can be made 'of the language from which the translation is taken, consistently with the 'first requirement of all, that it be English.' He then discusses at some length, and very soundly and sensibly, the reasons why a very literal translation from a Greek author can never satisfy these conditions. Some of the fundamental differences in Greek and English, he says, are intractable, and he proceeds to enumerate these. Now, in our opinion, the first requirement of all is accuracy, by which we do not mean a servile closeness of rendering, but a full and perfect representation of the precise meaning of the original. A good and fluent English style is not really incompatible with this. Plato is better than Plato-and-water, so to say, and, for our own part, we should never be perfectly satisfied without a judicious combination of the two indispensable conditions,-accuracy of rendering and elegance of style. The position of the Platonic philosophy in reference to modern thought is briefly but well brought out in the new preface. At the same time reasons are given why thinkers and students of philosophy at the present day can hardly do without a complete edition of Plato in a handy and somewhat popular form. Plato was the father of 'idealism,' that is, he first went beyond the limits of mere sensation, and showed that certain fixed principles of thought, conception, and inductive reasoning were the only safe guides to truth. He is a great philosophical genius struggling with the unequal conditions of light and knowledge under which he is 'living.' The interest which he has for our own times does not depend on any continuity of modern from ancient thought. Modern thought had its own beginning, Mr. Jowett says (p. xix.), stimulated however into life by the influence of the older philosophies. Yet, he remarks, in thought, as in other things, there is a kind of cycle, and old ideas are constantly being reproduced, often with little or no consciousness on our parts that the same ideas were held and the same doctrines inculcated two thousand years ago. Especially is this true of the revised Materialism and Pantheism, in some modern speculations, which go back so closely to the views of Democritus and Epicurus. Both Mr. Grote and Professor Jowett have rendered immense service to the literature of our times, not merely as translators of Plato, but as exponents and critics of the Platonic doctrines. These two scholars are somewhat at variance. Mr. Grote labours to show that Plato was often wrong, both in his views and in his reasonings from them. Mr. Jowett takes Plato as we have him, not as a teacher of any perfect system, but as an early thinker groping his way from darkness into light. There can be no doubt that Plato carried idealism too far. He deals with metaphysical subjects, such as the immortality of the soul, as if they could be proved and established by logical reasoning alone. Aristotle's practical, but too subtle, mind revolted against the icia, or doctrine of abstractions; and yet his analysis of mind and soul are equally wanting in a basis of physical observation. Zeller, to whom Mr. Jowett justly pays a tribute of high praise at the conclusion of his preface, draws an excellent sketch of the relative position of these two great philosophers, master and pupil. Idealism, he observes, after being set forth by Plato with extraordinary brilliancy, had been brought into harmony with the most careful results of experience by Aristotle. Both had their weak points, due either to want of experience of the world and the laws of man's actions, or to the ' enthroning of idealism as the knowledge of conceptions.' To the former cause he attributes mistakes in natural science, or arising from a limited view of history; to the latter, the too strongly-marked contrasts between abstract and concrete, particular and general, form and matter, the seen and the unseen, knowledge and ignorance. In a word, both attached too much importance to mental criticism and logical deduction, and too little to the observation of facts and their reasons, 6 |