Lightfoot had not prepared for publication have lost through the want of his further work at them. But, though we feel that our criticisms are just, and that thoughtful students of the Bishop's other commentaries will already in reading these Epistles have made for themselves notes which substantially correspond with many of the smaller notes which have never been published, and though it is to a certain extent unsatisfactory to have materials which have not been made ready for the press by their author, we cannot regret the publication of any part of the book. A more rigorous selection on the part of the editor might have rejected much which may be helpful to many, though not to all, readers; and we hope that the rest of this notice will give some idea how much there is which no student can afford to despise. There are so many words and phrases the treatment of which is full of the Bishop's well-known power that it is a difficult task to select examples. The notes on Tapákλŋσis (on 1 Thessalonians ii. 3), on the use of un with a participle (ibid. iii. 1), on σaíveolar (ibid. iii. 3), τὸ ἑαυτοῦ σκεῦος κτᾶσθαι (ibid. iv. 4), ὀψώνια (on Romans vi. 23), εὐλογητὸς ὁ Θεός (on Ephesians i. 3), οἰκονομία (ibid. i. 10), ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι (ibid.), and ἀρραβων (ibid. i. 14) have struck us as specially admirable. On points of a different kind, the note on Silas (on 1 Thessalonians i. 1), the brief comment on the 'unloving and illiberal spirit' of the Jews (ibid. ii. 15), the notice of the delicacy evinced by St. Paul' in his references to Apollos and Cephas (on I Corinthians i. 12), the reasons given for rejecting the very common view that St. Paul had been a married man (ibid. vii. 7), exhibit features of Bishop Lightfoot's best work. On still more important matters there are brief statements which call for much consideration, as when it is said that 'the interpretation' (i.e. of éñóriσev in 1 Corinthians iii. 6 by some of the Fathers) is instructive, as showing a general fault of patristic exegesis, the endeavour to attach a technical sense to words in the New Testament which had not yet acquired this meaning' (p. 188); and that Xápis is the watchword of St. Paul. It is the objective element, the divine counterpart, corresponding to the subjective element, the human correlative πίστις. . . . It is opposed to νόμος (Rom. vi. 14), as πίστις is to pya' (p. 189); and that ... 'the idea of the resurrection of the body is in reality not a philosophical difficulty but a philosophical necessity to us' (p. 215). And, if we cannot agree with quite all that is said about the anticipations by the Apostles of the second coming of Christ (pp. 65-67), we may call attention to the care and caution with which this subject is handled. Nor must we fail to notice the high value of some comments which bear directly on central truth, as the note 'It is worthy of notice that this ascription to our Lord of a divine power in ordering the doings of men occurs in the earliest of St. Paul's Epistles, and indeed probably the earliest of the New Testament writ ings: thus showing that there was no time, however early, so far as we are aware, when He was not so regarded, and confirming the language of the Acts of the Apostles, which represents the first converts appealing to Him as to one possessed of divine power' (p. 48) ; or the illustrations of 'the contrast between the gloomy despair of the heathen and the triumphant hope of the Christian mourner' (p. 63) ; or the note 'This verse' (i.e. 1 Thessalonians v. 10) 'is remarkable as enunciating the great Christian doctrine of the Redemption, to which elsewhere there is no allusion in the Epistles to the Thessalonians, though it forms the main subject of St. Paul's teaching in the second chronological group of his Epistles... Here the mention of it is important as showing that in his earliest writings this doctrine was present to St. Paul's mind, though he has busied himself generally in these Epistles with other matters. It was not therefore, as has been maintained, an aftergrowth of his maturer reflections' (p. 77); or the statement that 'it is unsafe to infer... that the formula of Baptism in the name of the Trinity was dispensed with, and the name of Jesus alone pronounced. Baptism in or into the name of Jesus is to be regarded as an abridged expression to signify Christian Baptism, retaining the characteristic element in the formula' (p. 155). And, to pass by much on which we might well dwell at length, we have observed with interest on two very different matters that Bishop Lightfoot regards the well-known rough drawing which was found in the Pædagogium on the Palatine as a caricature of the crucifixion of our Lord' (p. 163), and accepts the interpretation of St. Paul's words oùк è̟yò ảλλà ô Kúpios (1 Corinthians vii. 10) which we have on several occasions found it necessary to maintain in the pages of this Review. 'The common conception of this phrase,' he says, 'is quite wrong. It is generally thought that the distinction on which St. Paul insists is the distinction between Paul inspired and Paul speaking of himself, between an utterance ex cathedra and a private opinion. The real difference is between the words of Paul the inspired Apostle and the express command of Christ Himself' (p. 225). It is our pleasant duty to add that the volume bears the marks of the skilled and careful editing which are characteristic of Dr. Harmer's work, and to express our hope that, as Bishop Lightfoot himself passed from his study to become one of the greatest of the Bishops of this century, so the Episcopate of the new Bishop of Adelaide may be not unworthy of his repute as a scholar. 1 An excellent description of this drawing is quoted from Garrucci's 'Deux Monuments des premiers Siècles de l'Eglise expliqués,' in Liddon's Bampton Lectures, p. 404, note ". Dr. Liddon, who gives a number of useful references on the point, explained the drawing in the same way that it is understood by Bishop Lightfoot, as a caricature of the Crucifixion. A different view of it is given in King, The Gnostics and their Remains, pp. 230, 279, 433 (second edition), where the drawing is reproduced. Persecution and Tolerance. Being the Hulsean Lectures preached before the University of Cambridge in 1893-4. By M. CREIGHTON, D.D., Oxon. and Cam., Lord Bishop of Peterborough; late Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History in the University of Cambridge; Hon. Fellow of Merton College, Oxford, and Emmanuel College, Cambridge; LL.D. of Glasgow and Harvard; D.C.L. of Durham; Litt. D. of Dublin ; Fellow of the Società Romana di Storia Patria. (London : Longmans, Green, and Co., 1895.) THIS interesting series of lectures is marked by the knowledge and depth we expect to find in any work by the Bishop of Peterborough. It contains a theory of the causes of persecution by Christians which differs very considerably from opinions on the subject that are common. The Bishop himself points out that the origin of persecution is commonly found in the overwhelming claim which Christianity makes on its adherents' (p. 3), and states in sharp contrast to this opinion his own main conclusions in the following clear summary : These are (1) that persecution, or the infliction of punishment for erroneous opinions, was contrary to the express teaching of Christ, and was alien to the spirit of Christianity; (2) was adopted by the Church from the system of the world, when the Church accepted the responsibility of maintaining order in the community; (3) was really exercised for political rather than religious ends; (4) was always condemned by the Christian conscience; (5) was felt by those who used it to land them in contradictions; (6) neither originated in any misunderstanding of the Scriptures nor was removed by the progress of intellectual enlightenment, but (7) disappeared because the State became conscious that there was an adequate basis for the maintenance of political society in those principles of right and wrong which were universally recognized by its citizens, apart from their position or beliefs as members of any religious organization' (pp. 2-3). This position is obviously founded on very careful investigation of a large amount of evidence besides that which is referred to in the lectures. That this is the case would be the natural inference which would be drawn by any thoughtful reader who should observe the positive way in which conclusions are expressed, together with the clear indications of a balanced mind that is accustomed to weigh facts; and such an opinion is confirmed by the writer's high reputation as an historian, and established by his own half apology in the preface. 'No one,' he says, 'can feel more strongly than myself the triviality of this book as a contribution to the investigation of a large subject. It is only published in the hope that it may inspire some one to enter upon that subject with the thoroughness that it deserves. I have merely put together some conclusions which, in the course of my reading, came before my mind. They are fragmentary and incomplete; but I found that any serious attempt at expansion would entirely alter the form of the book' (Preface, p. v). It is, to a certain extent, unsatisfactory that conclusions which are based upon exceptional learning should be published without a VOL. XL.-NO. LXXX. K K systematized statement of the facts upon which they rest. And we perhaps feel this the more strongly because we are prepared to go a very long way in the direction of the conclusions which the Bishop of Peterborough expresses. Indeed, so far as he affirms the great influence of political causes of persecution by Christians we are at one with him. What we doubt is whether he allows sufficient weight to the possibility of the sense of the exclusive claim of the Christian religion and the immense religious importance of promoting its interests being a genuinely felt motive for persecution, existing side by side with other reasons. In a passage of great power (pp. 16-21) the Bishop shows how St. James and St. John may have formed in their minds what would seem to them good reasons for the wish to call down fire from heaven on the Samaritan village, which was really the desire of personal feeling. And he takes this to be an illustration of the way in which the Church, while really allowing persecution for political reasons, imagined that there were good reasons of a different kind. 'Popes and prelates,' he says, 'with their minds made up on purely worldly grounds, sought for precedents and rejoiced to find them. They perverted God's message, with which they were entrusted, to the level of the world's maxims. They stifled conscience, they drowned the voice of understanding, they went far to quench the shining of the Light of the world, they certainly obscured its power to illuminate the dark places of politics and society' (pp. 27-8). Recognizing to the full that persecution by Christians has very frequently been due to 'purely worldly grounds,' we nevertheless are not prepared, without evidence with which we have not ourselves met, and of which it would be outside the scope of the plan of Bishop Creighton's lectures to treat, to abandon the opinion that, when St. Augustine sanctioned persecution, he was led to do so by genuinely religious motives, and that, to take the sixteenth century as an illustration, there were some at that time who honestly believed that the religious good of mankind required the forcible suppression of ideas they held to be mischievous. The interest of this work is not confined to the particular point on which we have dwelt. The claim that it is unjust to charge Christianity with the persecuting spirit and the explanation of the true nature of tolerance receive valuable treatment. The allusions to littleknown writings indicate the learning which the Bishop has at his command. The whole book is full of sentences that are provocative of trains of thought. While here and there on subordinate points,' in addition to the main question we have already noticed, we have not been able altogether to agree, the reading of the volume has been to us a real intellectual treat, and it has, as a rule, commanded our assent as well as our admiration. Not the least of its valuable qualities is the moral insight which distinguishes between the 'intellectual E.g. in the account of the growth of the penitential system on pp. 79-81 the Bishop does not, we think, sufficiently recognize that it was a means of actually conveying forgiveness as well as a discipline protective of the purity of the Church. 1 error' that causes 'moral confusion' and the 'moral error' that welcomes intellectual confusion as an ally' (p. 25), which observes 'that the sphere of human error in matters of morality is smaller than is generally supposed, and the sphere of sin is greater' (p. 29), which advocates the opinion that 'the standard of ethical judgment in dealing with secular history needs raising' (p. 33), and which points out that if the 'existing knowledge' of our Lord's time 'had been held in its purity, His extension of it would' have seemed 'natural and obvious' (p. 49). Edward Harold Browne, D.D., Lord Bishop of Winchester and Prelate of the Most Noble Order of the Garter. A Memoir. By G. W. KITCHIN, D.D., Dean of Durham. (London: John Murray, 1895.) Ir is by no means an easy task to write (without some danger of being misunderstood) our candid estimate of Dr. Kitchin's Memoir. It is no fault of the writer's that the interest of large sections of his work has been anticipated in the 'Lives' of Archbishop Tait and Dr. Pusey, and other recent publications; or that in the rapidity and urgency of modern Church life questions of importance in Bishop Harold Browne's days have been long since settled or superseded. Possibly we ought not to grumble at the proportions of over five hundred octavo pages, to which the work extends, but of which a very large part in the earlier years of its subject might well have been spared us, the career of the future prelate up to his appointment as Norrisian Professor presenting nothing of public interest. It is, we think, a more serious blot that Dr. Kitchin perpetually intrudes his own political opinions upon the reader, and apparently regards his biography of an eminently Conservative bishop as the most fitting. opportunity for ventilating his own views as a Radical dean. The result is that the onward flow of the narrative is disagreeably interrupted by assertions calculated in some cases to arouse antagonism, and with no claim to command even general assent. It is the more singular that Dean Kitchin should have been betrayed into such a course because he refers in his Preface to the peculiarity of his position, and this should, we think, have kept him from the wanton introduction of burning questions into the text of his Memoir. There is no space within the limits of a Short Notice for even a slight sketch of Harold Browne's career. He enjoyed the priceless blessing of a judicious and religious early home training, and passed from Eton to Cambridge with all the charm of a bright, eager conversationalist, and so high a moral character as to influence his college friends in a very marked degree. Despite considerable abilities and acquirements, he did not take a high place in either the Classical or Mathematical Tripos; but he obtained University distinction as Crosse and Tyrrwhitt's Hebrew Scholar, and won the Norrisian prize by an essay of such unusual excellence as to attract the attention of Dr. Whewell. So that he was regarded as a man of high ability and no mean acquirements when he resigned his fellow 1 See pages 195, 280, 287, 295, 321, 376, 378, 399. |