But the mistatements in these volumes are of more importance than the mistranslations. For example; on the text, "While we were yet without strength, even then at the appointed time Christ died for the ungodly." The commentator remarks in a manner which implies, in full accordance with an exposition recently quoted, that there was no such ungodliness in a Pharisaic Jew, as should render the sacrifice of Christ's death necessary, "Though it is plain (says he) that the Apostle's language is intended to express their character and state, as heathen previous to their conversion, to avoid offence, he uses the first person, as though he had himself been implicated in the charge; whereas before his conversion, he had been a Jew, and as touching the righteousness which is of the law blameless. What then can be more evident, than that the justification and reconciliation here mentioned mean nothing more than their admission into the Christian community, and their participation of the blessings of the Gospel? from being sinners (that is Gentiles) they are become holy." vol. i. pp. 101-105. The inference also drawn from the Apostle's reasoning in this chapter, contains a mistatement of his argument. But, as Mr. Belsham confutes both Paul and Moses in the next sentence, the mistatement here is of the less consequence. "His argument (says this corrector of Prophets and Apostles), if it proves any thing, proves, that all, without exception, who have been sufferers by the fall, shall be eventually raised to life and happiness. But, as the account of the fall is precarious, and cannot be received as an historic fact, so the analogical argument borrowed from it must be regarded as proportionably precarious." vol. i, p. 123. Farther on, when it is said by St. Paul, that Christ died unto sin, Mr. Belsham infers from that expression, that the state in which Christ was, before he died, was a state of sin, though in his case (it would appear) sin does not mean sin. "As applied to Christ, it perhaps expresses that state of frailty and suffering to which our Lord was exposed during his personal ministry; sin and suffering being regarded by the Jews almost as convertible terms; or, it may express a state in which he was persecuted by sinners, by Jews and Gentiles, by careless priests, and people, by whom he was charged with sin, and treated, as an offender." vol. i. p. 132. Mr. Belsham has great authorities, but (we imagine) no proof on his side, when, in reference to the memorable confession of St. Paul, in the latter part of the seventh chapter of this Epistle, he says, "It is of great consequence to recollect that the Apostle is not speaking in his own person, but in that of a Jew under the law, who, being awakened to a sense of the evil of sin, and a desire to forsake it, is thrown into despair, and hardened in guilt by the unrelenting severity of the law." (vol. i. p. 151.) Why this should be as Mr. Belsham represents it, does not appear; nor does it appear to us how it can be of great consequence that it should be so, when a commentator is at liberty to set aside any of St. Paul's reasonings that displease him, and to represent them as unworthy of notice. "the Among the numerous instances that might be adduced in which Mr. Belsham lowers the import of the Apostolical doctrines, one of the most remarkable is that which, in uniformity with his singular canon of interpretation, represents mysterious wisdom of God, that hidden wisdom, which God preordained before the ages," as relating to nothing more than the adoption of Gentiles into his church. "None of the leaders and instructors of the Jewish nation, none of the Scribes and Pharisees, the priests and doctors of the law, the wise and subtle disputants of the schools, ever divined or anticipated this liberal and most benevolent plan of Divine wisdom, that the heathen, whom they treated with such contempt and scorn, should be received into the Divine favour, and admitted into the family of God." This is the wisdom which, according to the same translator, none of the rulers of this age knew; for, if they had known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." (vol. ii. pp. 37-39.) Nevertheless, in order to extract this sense from the words of St. Paul, it is necessary to suppose that he described the governors of Judea in opposition to the governors of the heathen world, by the phrase, the rulers of this world: and then what is the sentiment distilled out by this process of transmutation? That, if the Jewish rulers had known that God would call the Gentiles into his church, they would not have crucified Jesus Christ. Is not this changing the Apostle's gold into dross? How completely also do the form and beauty of that magnificent description in Col. i. 18, 19, of the glory of Christ, even in his incarnate condition, shrink into nothing under the paralysing hand of Mr. Belsham! He translates it thus: "By him God was pleased to inhabit the whole complete body, and through him to reconcile all things to himself, whether things on earth, or things in heaven;' and what he has translated he has thus explained. "To inhabit all fulness by Christ. That is, to inhabit the church which is the npwux, the fulness or complement of Christ. All is added, because there is a double fulness; a fulness of the Jews, and a fulness of the Gentiles. By the mission of Jesus, and particularly by his death, he has confirmed the new covenant and set aside the old, incorporating Jew and Gentile into one harmonious society." vol. iii. pp. 426, 427. After thus diluting some other of his author's strong statements, Mr. Belsham acknowledges, that "the rapturous language of the Apostle is apt to appear unnatural, affected, and insipid." (vol. iii. p. 147.) We think so indeed, whenever the word Salvation, a word of such cardinal value in the New Testament, is not allowed by the translator to retain its proper force and meaning. Thus he observes upon Phil. ii. 12, that " ownpia is unquestionably sometimes used in the sense of temporal welfare, prosperity, or comfort;" (vol. iii. p. 346;) and even the remarkable language of St. Paul, in Tit. iii. 4, 5, where he confessedly speaks of salvation in a higher sense than that of temporal comfort, gives occasion to the following frigid commentary. "They who are introduced into this state, (that is, into the profession of the Gospel,) are said to be saved; that is, rescued from the bondage of idolatry, or from the yoke of the law." (vol. iv. p. 406.) Even sanctification also, the great work of God in making a sinner whole, is confined by this expositor to the primitive ages: for the sanctification of the Spirit, in 2 Thess. ii. 13, is thus explained by him in conformity to Dr. Chandler: "By the spirit, in his extraordinary gifts, God gave them the assurance, that he had accepted them." vol. iv. p. 139. The author indeed allows, in one place, that the conversion of the first Christians was a preternatural work: for he represents St. Paul as saying to the Corinthians. "No argument or persuasion of mine would ever have induced any one of you to have renounced the idolatry in which you had been educated, or the vices to which you were habituated. All is the work of God." (vol. ii. p. 453.) Yet, when he interprets the promise of writing the law in men's hearts, instead of finding in that preterhe admits, a fulfilment of the natural work, the reality of which promise, he explains it thus: "God himself foretold, that he is about to introduce a new covenant; the laws of which, instead of being. engraven on tables of stone, should be inscribed on the tables of the heart: or, in other words, the precepts of which would be so few and simple, that all might understand, retain, and practise them." vol. iv. p. 609. There seems, indeed, sometimes an eagerness to represent the sacred writers as saying that which is of little value, even where no important object, at least none that is essential to the Socinian scheme, is attained by it. Thus, Heb. x. 39, is translated; "Now, the just by faith shali live. Yet, if he draw back, God saith, I will have no complacency in him.' But, we are not of those who draw back to destruction; but of those who have faith to their own deliverance." This last expression is explained, as if the writer were alluding to the escape of the believing Hebrews from the approaching calamities of their country. There appears to be no motive for this alteration of what is allowed to be," an excellent and most important sense," unless it be a desire to get rid of the idea of a separate soul. In the second clause of the verse, the original phrase is, "My soul shall have no pleasure in him;" on which the author observes: "This is one instance, among innumerable others, to prove, that the soul does not signify a separate, immaterial substance, but a person's self. No one will maintain, that God has a separable soul.” Therefore, the word soul, was also to be left out, and the idea of spiritual salvation dropped, in translating the last clause. As for the remark, that the sense of the salvation of the soul, as the result of vital faith, "is not so agreeable to the context," (vol. iv. pp. 630, 631,) as the other, we cannot imagine on what grounds it is asserted. In the Epistles to Timothy, the commentator seems to delight in keeping the apostolical character out of sight, and reducing the tone of his letters down to that of a famifiar correspondence between two intimate friends. Thus, St. Paul is represented, as saying, and that too when he was in expectation of martyrdom, "My old friends have left me, and I have not yet formed many new connexions: I shall therefore pass a solitary and uncomfortable winter, if you and Mark do not give me your company." (vol. iv. p. 362.) Alexander" is a bitter enemy to the gospel, and especially to the doctrine which you and I think it our duty to teach." (vol. iv, p. 358.) In the title of one of the sections we read: "The Apostle expresses his earnest desire to see his friend," (vol. iv. p. 354,) and every where throughout the paraphrase Timothy is described as the friend, not the disciple and helper, of the Apostle. For example: "I have been advising you, my dear friend, to adapt your discourses to the understandings and the characters of your hearers." (vol. iv. p.314.) "In the course of your ministry, my dear friend, short as that period has been, you have known many, who have totally apostatised from the faith." (vol.iv. p.325.) The following is not very apostolic language: "I am proud to say, that I have resolutely and firmly adhered to the cause in which I was embarked, and to the principles, with which I entered upon the contest." vol. iv. p. 352. The necessity which we have been under, of exposing the many perversions of this writer, leave us no room to point out a few instances of well-placed ingenuity, which here and there occur. One peculiarity in the idiom of St. Paul, however, which occurs in several places, and particularly in Gal. ii. 19, "I am dead to the law," is happily solved by him: "Perhaps the sense will be more clear if the phrase is considered as an hypallage, not unusual with the Apostle. To avoid the offensive expression, the law is dead,' he says, 'I am dead to the law,' meaning, that with respect to himself the law had ceased to exist, and he was now at liberty to enter into the service of a new master; i. e. the gospel." (vol. iii. p. 47.) A similar idiom in 1 Cor. ix. 23, is thus explained “'Iva συγκοινωνος αυτό γένωμαι, that I may be a joint-partaker of it; i. e. that I, who am a partaker, may induce others to become fellowpartakers with me," a mode of expression not uncommon with the apostle; vide Gal. iii. 22. Rom. viii. 29. Another phrase in 1 Cor. xv. 54, is well interpreted, according to Whitby, "Death is swallowed for ever," &ç vikoç: for which up his references to the Septuagint in Isa. xxv. 8; 2 Sam. ii. 26; Job xxxvi. 7; Jer. iii. 5; Lam. iii. 20; Amos i. 11, viii. 7, are quoted, vol. ii. p. 373. One of the most useful arguments in the book is very frequently repeated, but not more frequently than it deserves. It is that which shews the value of the Epistles of the New Testament, as evidences of the truth of Christianity and of the miracles to which it appeals. On this subject the author writes, as follows: : "The acknowledged genuineness of this Epistle," the First to the Corinthians, "is a fact of the greatest importance, and affords an irresistible proof of the truth and divine authority of the Christian religion for the Apostle states, as matters of public notoriety, facts which could have no existence, if Christianity were false and which no person in his right mind would have appealed to, if they had been capable of contradiction. I mean in particular the existence and the abuse of miraculous powers in the Corinthian church." (vol. ii. p. 6.) "The Apostle addresses the Corinthians as persons who were familiar with these extraordinary powers, who understood their several distinctions, who severally possessed them, who disputed with each other concerning their relative value and precedence, and who were guilty of great indecorum in the exercise of their respective gifts in their public assemblies. All this is well, supposing these gifts to have existed, these controversies to have risen, and these irregularities to have prevailed in the Corinthian church. But, if the contrary were true, if there were no holy spirit, no gift of tongues, no spirit of prophecy, no miraculous powers, no mutual jealousy about precedence, no affectation of display, nothing but what existed in the Apostle's own imagination, the only alternative is, that the Apostle was out of his mind." (vol. ii. pp. 250, 251.) "But no one who reads and understands this Epistle will presume to charge the author with hallucination of intellect. Therefore these spiritual gifts must have existed in all the variety which the Apostle states: and consequently the Christian religion, thus attested and sealed, must be of Divine origin." vol. ii. p. 306. We only wish, that the author of these conclusive reasonings had drawn one further inference from them, or rather that he had seen cause to admit in its full extent the claims urged by the Apostle himself in this very Epistle : "Let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord." 1 Cor. xiv. 37. But in respect to the inspiration of these writings, Mr. Belsham delivers his judgment very distinctly: "Whether these Epistles are canonical or not, is a verbal controversy. If canonical means inspired, neither these nor any other of the apostolic writings are so." (vol. iii. p. 497.) So says Mr. Belsham. But what says St. Peter on the same question? the same question? Referring to the Epistles of St. Paul and their contents, he says, that "there are some things in them which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest,. as they do also the other Scriptures." And what says St. Paul? "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God." Let the reader choose on which of these authorities he ought to rely. But indeed Mr. Belsham has himself determined that point for him, for he tells us, that the Apostles always possessed a complete knowledge of the gospel revelation; and whatever they say or write upon this subject is of the highest authority." vol. iii. p. 497. This, however, being the judgment of Mr. Belsham in regard to the Apostolic writings, what does he say concerning the Old Testament? "If it was true, as related in the history, that the Israelites were by a public incontestible miracle put in possession of Jericho, it must be allowed that they are to be regarded as the authorized executioners of Divine justice. How far the authority of the history is sufficient to establish this fact, is another question." (vol. iv. p. 666.) Inspiration being thus denied to the apostolical and to the historical Scriptures, is there any part of the Divine volume to which it is conceded? Yes, the prophetical: and accordingly Mr. Belsham introduces a singular distinction between the Scriptures and the inspired Scriptures, when St. Paul's broad declaration, that the holy Scriptures are able to make us wise unto salvation, comes in his way: "This observation is to be understood of the inspired prophetic Scriptures, and probably of them alone." vol. iv. p. 338. Here then lies the grand difficulty. Till Unitarians shall admit the entire authority of the sacred volume, we have no common data from which to reason. That which is conclusive proof to us, is none to them: nor must they be surprised, if, while they can treat the sacred volume with that freedom which characterizes Mr. Belsham's remarks upon Moses and St. Paul, we regard them as of a different religion from ourselves. "Relieve the Oppressed;" a Sermon preached at the Parish Church of West Bromwich, Sunday, Nov. 27, 1825, on the Duty of the People of this Country towards their fellow-Subjects, the British Negro Slaves. By the Rev. CHARLES TOWNSEND, A. M. London. 1826. WB select this sermon for notice precisely because it is a sermon. It would be far beyond our limits to attempt to review all the very numerous, and manyofthem truly excellent, publications which the national abhorrence of slavery has called forth within the last two or three years. Several of the most important of them have already been noticed in our pages, and others may be so hereafter; but the sermon now before us has this among its other claims on our attention, that it is the first published discourse from the pulpit of a parish church which has reached us relative to our duties, as they regard our fellow-subjects, the British Negro Slaves." There has CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 290. been no deficiency of reports and pamphlets, of essays and addresses, of remonstrances, and speeches, and petitions, to prove the ardour which persons of all ranks and classes among us, with the exception of a few interested or misjudging individuals, most justly feel for the extinction of slavery throughout the British dominions. The rapid progress of the public zeal on this great question is even beyond what the most sanguine friend to the abolition of slavery could possibly have anticipated. The proceedings in Parliament attest this; the petitions presented to that august body attest it; the rapid multiplication of works from the press on the subject attest it; the numerous public meetings held in various parts of the kingdom, and the addresses delivered at them attest it; the conscientious abstinence of tens of thousands of persons from slave-grown sugar, and the unwearied zeal of many more in the intercourse of private life to promote the common cause, attest it: we may even add, that in many instances the discourses of clergymen and dissenting ministers have attested it; but not, we think, "to the height of this great argument;" not as fully or generally as comports with the duty of the clergy and the instruction of their flocks, or as the spiritual as well as temporal interests of many hundreds of thousands of oppressed immortal beings and their posterity to future generations require. There is, we know, a repugnance in many excellent clergymen to occupy the Christian pulpit with a theme which unhappily has given rise to much debate, and has been blended by the opponents of the abolition of slavery with questions of mere political expediency. They are afraid of awakening secular feelings or inflaming angry passions; and, regarding the whole question rather as one of national economics than of Christian duty, they view it as proscribed in a place sacred to religious themes. We can well un P |