Theology, Philosophy, and Philology. 283 of modern unbelief. No one saw this more clearly than Dr. Henry Smith, and therefore perhaps he was not always so tolerant as he might have been of those who, in the exercise of their freedom, diverged from the ordinarily accepted creeds. We have an interesting illustration of this characteristic in the essay on 'The New Latitudinarians of England '— the new Latitudinarians dealt with being the authors of that once notorious and now half-forgotten volume, 'Essays and Reviews.' The incisive criticism applied to these writers holds up to scorn their halfness, their lack of originality and thoroughness, and the want of knowledge of their authors even of the very sources in German theology and philosophy from which they had borrowed their principles. Now that time has modified the acerbities which the volume at first called forth, there will be hesitation in accepting everything which is here said, but there can be no question of the thoroughness and penetrative keenness of the criticism. But it is not as a theological controversialist that we would most highly esteem Dr. Smith's work. Turning to an essay here on Sir William Hamilton's Theory of Knowledge,' we find that as a metaphysical thinker he is equally keen, subtle, and penetrating. He drags to light the hidden inconsistencies of the Hamiltonian thought, and holds up to view the incongruous elements of which his theory of Nescience is composed. He makes plain the fundamental absurdity of founding knowledge upon ignorance, positive thought upon negative impotences, affirmative judgments upon the imbecilities of reason. We might go over each essay of the twelve composing the volume and show its characteristic excellences, but we have said enough, we hope, to excite interest in this latest product of American thought and scholarship. For Dr. Smith, though cosmopolitan in his culture, was an American, and deeply appreciated the precise elements which America has contributed to theology. For, while Puritan in character, American theology has its individual characteristics. It was profoundly moulded by the influence of Jonathan Edwards, and his two great works on the Freedom of the Will and the Highest Standard of Virtue imposed its peculiar form on its theology. Dr. Henry B. Smith evidently was one of its finest products. He bodied forth its characteristic excellences. His wide philosophical culture was combined with a strong tendency towards compact systematic thought, and his wide intellectual sympathies were held in union with keen and earnest faith in the historical realities of the Christian revelation. We very heartily commend this volume to all the British Churches which hold the faith. Outlines of the History of Religion to the Spread of the Universal Religions. By C. P. TIELE, Professor of the History of Religion in the University of Leyden. Translated from the Dutch, by J. ESTLIN CARPENTER, M.A. Trübner and Co. This volume is another of the series of the English and Foreign Philosophical Library of Messrs. Trübner and Co., and will be found not the least valuable member of it. In days in which very large volumes are often made out of a diffuse expansion of comparatively scanty materials, it is seldom necessary to complain of the substance of a book being manifestly too weighty for its form. But this is the first criticism that occurs to us regarding Professor Tiele's work. In a few prefatory words which he has supplied for the English edition, he says that he has only given 'outlines' or mere 'pencil-sketches.' More than that cannot yet be attempted in the present state of our knowledge of the ancient religions. We so entirely concur with his view, that we are glad to find our own opinion corroborated from so authoritative a source. "The time for writing an elaborate History of Religion,' he says, 'even of Religions, has not yet come. Not a few special investigations must be instituted, not a few difficult questions elucidated, before anything like this can be done.' What can be accomplished, and is here attempted, is to sum up the amount of certain knowledge, gathered by the researches of several years, and to sketch the draft of what may at some time become a living picture.' To avoid the danger of what Professor Tiele calls Hierology losing itself in abstract speculations, a general survey of the whole subject is, he thinks, required as a kind of guide, and he has set down his conclusions in a short paragraph style, adding explanatory remarks and bibliographical notices on the literature of the subject as he goes. Even this history is not complete, as the author only deals with the ancient religions which embrace a tribe, a people, or a race, or which have grown into separate sects, leaving aside the history of the universal religions, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam. But he claims that, incomplete and fragmentary as it is, the work is a history, not of religions, but of religion. His object has been to show how the one great psychological phenomenon which we call religion has developed and manifested itself in such various shapes among the different races and peoples of the world. He professes to show that all religions- the 'universal,' therefore, as well as the tribal and local-have been developed out of the same simple germs, and to trace how these germs have attained such varied forms and developments. At this point we find it hard to accept the author's teaching. All history may be said to be a record of evolution, and religion comes under the same universal law as other branches of inquiry. So far as it is science at all, it may be claimed that it must be that, and the science of religion is bound down to exhibit the processes of growth and transformation. But we are not therefore at starting bound to accept as a foregone conclusion that the history of the religious consciousness must be nothing else but that. We can understand the claim that this has been ascertained, but it must be as the result of investigation. To assume it as the first condition of all inquiry, is surely nothing better than dogmatism of the most absolute character. Especially is it so when it is notorious that the power of the growth of the naturalistic elements to evolve the actual results is not only doubted, but denied. Notwithstanding the cautious terms in which Professor Tiele states his fundamental principle, it takes for granted at the outset everything Theology, Philosophy, and Philology. 285 which it must be the great object of his work to establish. The fundamental principle of development (which is admittedly only an hypothesis) is stated to be that all changes and transformations in religion, whether they appear from a suggestive point of view to indicate decay or progress, are the results of natural growth, and find in it their best explanation.' The history of religion unfolds the method in which this development is determined by the character of nations and races, as well as by the influence of the circumstances surrounding them, and of special individuals, and it exhibits the established laws by which this development is controlled.' It may be admitted that this is the work which science must set itself to accomplish; but what is to be done when in carrying on its work science finds itself confronted with facts and phenomena which cannot be accounted for as an evolvement determined by external influences and by circumstances and individuals? Is science bound to disregard and push aside results which are not so explicable, which testify to the action of higher causes that are not in any sense due to a process of 'natural growth,' but which mark new beginnings, fresh points of departure for which we must seek explanation in a wholly different region? To this inquiry Professor Tiele gives us no answer, and we are entitled therefore to decline to accept his fundamental principle' as adequate to the work assigned it. Nevertheless there is a sphere in which the natural growth of religious phenomena is to be traced, and here he will be found invaluable as a guide. Beginning with 'Religion under the control of Animism,' he follows the course of religion among the Chinese, among the Hamites and Semites (including the Egyptians, the Babylonians and Assyrians, and the Israelites), and among the Indo-German races (including the Hindus, and last of all the Greeks and Romans). Professor Tiele vouches for the English version, which he says 'is thoroughly revised and corrected.' We need only add that the book is thoroughly rationalistic, and is quite as daring and reckless as any of the productions of Kuenen., Reasons of Unbelief. With an Appendix. If sceptics and unbelievers were more commonly addressed in the tone and manner exemplified in this little work, we can hardly doubt that their number would be diminished. There are, of course, arrogant and hardened disbelievers-to whom alone the harsh term 'infidel,' as implying ethical blemish or defect, is applicable-but there are others who are repelled from Christianity by difficulties which it should not be considered impossible to remove, and by the faults and shortcomings of Christians, both in conduct and in the presentation of doctrine. The author of the work before us is so convinced that this is the case, that he expresses a belief that the chief obstacle to the progress of Divine truth in the minds of men is the want of its being sufficiently presented.' Under such a conviction he does not feel called upon so much to establish the negative to the sceptic's positions-to show that they are untrue—as to exhibit the positive Divine truth in its fulness and completeness. This is done even in the exposition of the reasons of unbelief' which are the hindrance to the acceptance of Christianity by some thoughtful minds. The first chapter opens with a discussion of the allegation that Christian truth is only a sentiment or an abstraction; and in meeting this negative position the author sets forth the leading doctrine which justifies the reasonableness of Christianity, by exhibiting its harmony with the whole order of things. The disclosures of the Divine Revelation are not unnatural, as has been often alleged, but are the outcome of the principles on which the constitution of the universe is itself founded. This view of the eternal nature of Christianity, centred round the person of Christ as the Eternal Word, 'the first-born of every creature,' is the key-note of the book, and all that is seemingly polemical in it is linked with this presentation. For the author cherishes the purpose of overcoming error and showing the insufficiency of reasons for unbelief' by taking us up into the higher plane in which spiritual principles are seen to be the realities of things. Viewing Revelation as a progressive development in and through the history of man, the author is naturally led to treat of the person and ministry of Jesus Christ as the centre of universal history. In dealing with the difficulties suggested by prospects of the future, he exhibits a reverential and cautious spirit, which rebukes the reckless hardihood of those who dogmatize on the awful mysteries which the Divine Revelation, doubtless by design, has left in obscurity. Yet there is no reason why that gloom should not be relieved by hope. There are in this book points as to which there will be differences of opinion. In regard to the functions of the Church, or perhaps we should rather say as to its definition, there will be not a few who will question the accuracy of the view set forth here. But that is comparatively a minor point; the author's view does not necessarily exclude a different definition which will render the Church yet more comprehensive than it appears to be with him. The Story of Christianity: from the Apostles to the Present Day. By the Rev. ANDREW REED, B.A. Second Edition. Hamilton, Adams, and Co. The Story of Religion in England. A Book for Young Folk. By BROOKE HERFORD. C. Kegan Paul and Co. Mr. Reed has completed a very useful handbook, which fills a place of its own, and presents the facts and developments of Church history in lights which we deem both spiritual and true. Men who exaggerate ecclesiastical forms and developments will resent his estimates, but it is precisely because of their exaggerations that a popular and attractive history like this, carefully studied and skilfully presented, is so valuable. Certainly no history of men or things affords so much that is romantic Theology, Philosophy, and Philology. 287 and absorbing even for non-religious readers. Mr. Reed is not always so accurate in minute facts as he might be, but these in no way affect the general character and impression of events; and so much is compressed into his limited space, that it would need infallibility to avoid all errors. In the broad aspects and lights of a true history his little book will be most useful to young students. Religion enters so vitally and largely into the life of a nation, and into the forces that mould its character, that it is an essential part of every national history, and, institutionally at least, it is so distinctive that it is easily separable; while English history, being far more insulated by geographical necessity than that of any continental nations, can be treated more distinctly and completely. Mr. Brooke Herford will be known to many of our readers as an able and catholic-hearted Unitarian minister, the friend and biographer of Travers Madge. A few years ago he emigrated to Chicago, where he now ministers. Of course his history is written from the theological standpoint of a Unitarian, and he judges of doctrine in Unitarian lights: he could not honestly do otherwise. We are glad, however, to speak of the fairness and catholicity of spirit which characterizes his book. We have nothing but praise to bestow upon the literary skill and scholarly care of its execution. Never forgetting the class for which he writes, he selects salient and characteristic points with much skill, and illumines them and makes them picturesque by personal incident and anecdote. Beginning with the dawn of English history, he traces our national religious life down to the present time, doing full justice to the great revival epochs of it from Wicliffe to Wesley, and always evincing the fullest sympathy with spiritual, religious, and ecclesiastical liberty. Masters in English Theology. Being the King's College Lectures for 1877. Edited, with a Historical Preface, by ALFRED BARRY, D.D., Principal. The Classic Preachers of the English Church. Lectures delivered at St. James's Church in 1877. With an Introduction by JOHN EDWARD KEMP, M.A., Rector. John Murray. We are glad to see the idea embodied in the St. James's Lectures extending. Great theological writers and great preachers are landmarks. They represent and embody changes, if not of direction, yet of colour and feeling, which sensibly affect the course of religious life. English Protestantism is rich in great names, and we shall be glad if these examples incite Nonconformists to a similar treatment of their great preachers and theologians, although the previous St. James's Lectures have already included one or two of them. Indeed, this has already been done in part by the admirable volume of 'Pulpit Memorials' just published by Messrs. J. Clarke and Co. |