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Apocalypse, the Apostolical Constitutions and the Epistles of Ignatius" (p. 383). We must be careful not to accept unhesitatingly the testimony of their Catholic enemies against the heretics. "They called the dissenters and protestants of that time in general Gnostics. . . . . They branded all dissenters at that time as being the disciples of Simon Magus. . . . . But, in short, the grand heresy, and in which all the separate parties at that time agreed, was denying the authority of the Church" (p. 387). When the Catholics accuse the heretics of joining with the heathens, not only in common eating and drinking and intermarriage, but even in public festivals, we must admit (p. 388) that it was true, but remember that their plea for this was just, and grounded on St. Paul's doctrine in this very case; inasmuch as Paul had declared that the idol was nothing to him, and meat offered to it no more than common food. charge was not a moral one, but one affecting Christian liberty only. The mystery of iniquity was then already working, and the practices of the Catholic party answer to Paul's description of the man of sin or son of perdition, which was just then ready to be revealed (p. 390). Other methods of repressing the heretics failing, the Catholics "were obliged to fly to the authority of the Church in synods and councils, in which a few ignorant, superstitious bishops, meeting together in some small province or corner of the world, pretended to be under the immediate direction of the Holy Ghost, and to make laws and decretals for all Christendom.... I should have said that about this time the Catholics had collected a canon of Scripture, and endeavoured to make themselves the sole authoritative interpreters of it" (p. 397). "If we consider, therefore, by whom and upon what principles the canon of Scripture as we now have it was at first collected, revised and published, it is no wonder if it leans strongly towards Judaism, and seems at first sight to connect two opposite and contradictory religions one with another" (p. 441).

So thought and wrote Morgan in the second quarter of the pragmatical, unhistorical, one-sidedly abstract eighteenth century, wholly without the aids of modern Biblical criticism,

recent historical methods, or the Hegelian philosophy; of all which the newer Tübingen theology is usually alleged to be a by no means independent outcome. And yet the question irrepressibly suggests itself, How many well-informed Englishmen, lay or clerical, not being systematic students of scientific German theology, would have cherished a suspicion, had the above statement by Morgan been presented to them as a translation of one of the many recent popular expositions of Baur's scheme of the early Christian Church? Nor does it appear to us that if the Bristol physician of 1737 were set to the strange work of popularly expounding to the last quarter of the nineteenth century the outlines of results arrived at by an important school of historical criticism in the second quarter of this same century, he could be accused of missing or seriously misrepresenting the essential features. Of course it would be as easy as it would be interesting to point out considerable errors and deviations; but Morgan's deviations from the founder of the Tübingen school would hardly be greater than those to be pardoned in a somewhat unscientific disciple of the master, loyal in the main. It is certainly not wonderful that his Deistic" view of "the religion of Christ" as opposed to "the Christian religion" should seem to us antiquated; or that he should make somewhat wild work of the Gnostics as collectively free-thinking Deists (as if the forte of the Gnostics had been "common-sense" theology-as if Valentinian's system had been in the main one of "Natural Religion"); or that his argument at large is not sufficiently accompanied by a scholarly examination of the Scripture passages on which he founds, and that he neglects to consider pressing objections and difficulties. Much more singular is it that, writing when he did and as he did, he should so nearly have hit the track to which Baur, by a different path, was long after led; that he should so nearly have succeeded in putting together the elements of Baur's scheme of early Christianity, and that too in its more developed phase.

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The reader cannot have failed to remark that, while in the above abstract the Moral Philosopher is left to speak for him

self, with as few connective interpolations as possible, the order of statement chosen by Morgan has been somewhat altered. But if this should excite a doubt lest a series of detached extracts should have failed fairly to convey Morgan's meaning, the first glance at the Moral Philosopher will shew that, to avoid repetition, such an inversion of Morgan's order was inevitable. The exigencies of the dialogue form, unhappily chosen by Morgan and far from artistically managed, by no means account for the extraordinary confusion in which almost all the subjects debated by the Deists come up for discussion. Freethinking, Natural Religion, the Sacraments, Inspiration, the moral character of the Old Testament heroes, Miracles, emerge in the most unexpected way to disturb the main argument, which, it should be mentioned, is to expose and extirpate Judaistic elements in Christianity by help of Paul's teaching and practice, the key-note being already struck in the title of the work. Nor does it seem possible to explain why the same themes should continually re-appear, to be asserted again, without any new elements, in much the same shape as before, with copiousness of set phrases and reiterations. Morgan's critics seem all to have complained of this (so Leland, in the "Divine Authority of the Old and New Testament asserted"); and his reviewer in the Bibliothèque Britannique, Vol. XIII., prefaces his re-arranged exposition with the remark that there are three reasons why an argument should be confusedly stated: it may be that the author has not taken time to arrange his ideas, that he has not the capacity to do so, or that he wishes to confound and overwhelm the reader. The reviewer leans to the last hypothesis; we incline to the first. But a re-arrangement was necessary; and a reference to the Moral Philosopher will undoubtedly shew that this particular argument has neither lost nor gained in purport. Even without going beyond the quotations given, there are materials to make it clear that the collocation of the various passages accords with Morgan's view of the relation of Acts xv. and Galatians ii. In the Moral Philosopher, the Jerusalem Council of Acts xv. is first discussed at p. 54 as preliminary to the examination of the difficulties that led to the

tumult of Acts xxi. The same Council, with its Henoticon, is treated at great length again at p. 73. And there cannot be a doubt that the Council of pp. 362-364, here made to follow the "communing" of Gal. ii., is the same; though here Morgan specially founds on Galatians, and does not note that whereas at p. 73 he had spoken of Paul and Barnabas being sent as deputies from Antioch, he takes no note of Barnabas here. It is clear that Morgan adopts the views subsequently maintained by Neander and Lechler in their attempt to harmonize Acts and Galatians; namely, that the "communing" with Peter, James and John, just preceded the Council called by them immediately after. Morgan nowhere refers to Paul's earlier journey or journeys to Jerusalem (Acts ix.; Gal. i. 18; Acts xi. 30); and the phrase, “at his next return" (p. 56), shews that Morgan had not noticed Acts xviii. 18-23, or taken the trouble to examine the chronology of the journeys at all carefully. There are two minor points, however, on which it may be doubtful whether Morgan's full meaning is given above. In several passages in the Moral Philosopher, Morgan seems certainly to suggest that Jesus shared the hopes of his followers in looking forward to a restoration of a Jewish national kingdom; and that Paul's conduct was not always quite straightforward, in the matter of conformity to the law, even while his personal beliefs remained consistent. But even then the quotations certainly represent the opinion which Morgan generally and explicitly asserted; while on the main question, the relation of Paul's teaching as a whole to that of the other apostles and the Jewish Christians, the extracts abundantly shew what Morgan believed.

The brief statement of Baur's general position given at the beginning, cannot enable readers otherwise unacquainted with the works of the Tübingen school to appreciate the very many specific points in which Morgan has so nearly hit their mark. For the sake of such readers, we draw attention to some of the more outstanding features common to both, or in which they very nearly agree. 1. The Epistles of Paul, especially the second chapter of Galatians, are the key to the whole position. And though Morgan does not directly impugn the authorship

of Acts by a truth-speaking apostolic man, he manifestly accepts Paul's statements unhesitatingly, and regards the account of the Jerusalem Council given in Acts with unmistakable suspicion. The author of Acts did not at least tell the whole truth when he represented Paul as accepting the decree of the Council. And the substance of Paul's teaching in all his Epistles is treated as wholly discordant with the tone of Acts throughout. 2. The controversy between Paul and Peter at Antioch is the outcome of the "standing controversy" between Paul and the Twelve on questions of vital importance, not on a matter of mere detail with regard to occasional conformity. The quarrel between Paul and Barnabas had its origin in the same difference as to the law. The "certain that came from James" were Judaizing zealots, but had James's direct sanction. The Asiatic Jews who accused Paul on his last visit to Jerusalem were not unbelieving Jews, but Jewish Christians. 3. Paul's "own gospel" was a very different oue from that of the Twelve. The first Christians were Jews who, on conversion, changed their creed in no way save by adding the belief that Jesus was the Messiah. 4. The main questions in dispute between Paul and the apostles were as given by Morgan, and continued to harass the Church all Paul's lifetime and long after his death. 5. Paul asserted a direct call to the apostleship from Jesus, as immediate and authoritative as that of the Twelve, and he asserted it against them. If the opinion as to the mode of Paul's call from Christ, attributed by Morgan to Agrippa and Festus, is, as seems most likely, Morgan's own, this would be an additional ground of comparison (not direct agreement) between him and Baur: that Paul was a "man of the strictest honesty and integrity, but of a warm imagination and a little tainted with enthusiasm, or too much inclined to be influenced by dreams, visions and supernatural communications" (Moral Philosopher, Vol. I. p. 69). Against Peter, Paul claims sole apostleship of the Gentiles. Peter's presence or episcopate at Rome is a pure fiction. 6. The "four necessary things" of the Jerusalem decree, which, unlike Baur, Morgan regards as having really been promulgated in the way

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