259 Review. The Scripture Reader's Guide. ing village repose, and as calculated to teach those to think, whose duty is only to obey. Through these scenes of domestic intricacy the author well knows how to conduct his readers, whom he convinces more by the results of his statements, than by the force of argument which he puts into the mouth of his speakers. Among the episodal characters, several are admirably drawn; whether we view them as designed to excite our abhorrence, or to urge us to imitation. As a whole, it is a work replete with valuable instruction, invariably inculcating all that is praiseworthy, and directing its shafts against the fashionable vices, prevailing follies, and vacillating principles, of the day. "The Rev. Thomas Spencer was born at Hert ford, January 21, 1792. Even when a child, preachers and preaching seemed to occupy nearly all his thoughts. The manuscript of a sermon, written when he was about twelve years old, is still preserved, which shews the early bias of his mind, and indicates his future superiority. In 1806, when he was about fifteen, he was placed by Thomas Wilson, Esq. under the care of the Rev. William Hordle, of Harwich, to enter on his preparatory studies. In January 1807, he was admitted into Hoxton college. During the vacation in the following midsummer, he preached his first sermon in public, at Collier's End,' a small village near Hertford. This sermon is the first in the present volume, and was preached July 5th, 1807: the two following sermons were also delivered in the same month. The dates affixed to the ensuing discourses, will shew the time when they were preached, and will account for the early popularity which Mr. Spencer acquired. "In the midsummer vacation of 1810, he was appointed to preach to a congregation at Liverpool. His sermons excited extraordinary attention, and he was invited to the pastoral office. "On Sunday the 3d of February, 1811, Mr. Spencer commenced his stated engagements at Liverpool, just after he had attained his twentieth year. His preaching attracted such overflowing congregations, that in a few months it was found absolutely necessary to erect a much larger chapel, of which the first stone was laid on the 15th of April, 1811, and in which the Rev. Dr. Raffles now successfully labours. But it pleased Him whose designs are inscrutable to man, though always wise and good in themselves, to cut short the days of this most promising and devoted young minister, after he had been settled about six months at Liverpool. "On Monday morning August 5th, he resolved to bathe in the river Mersey, thinking it might brace his nerves after the exertions of the preceding Sabbath, and prepare him for the duties to which he intended to devote the day. He had folded his paper, and prepared his pen, in order to 260 compose a sermon to be preached in the ensuing week, on behalf of the Religious Tract Society. Mr. Spencer left his paper and pen prepared for this purpose, and proceeded to the river Mersey to bathe. While undressing himself, he was engaged in humming a hymn tune. He entered the river, was borne out by the current, sunk in the deep water, and was drowned: thus suddenly was he called from early labours on earth, to an early and eternal reward in heaven." Preface. in The sermons which fill this volume, are perfect unison with what might be expected from the preceding character of their author, which is but an epitome of an enlarged and admirably written memoir of this eminent but youthful servant of God, published not long after the time of his unexThese sermons, written on some important pected death, by the Rev. Dr. Raffles. passages selected both from the Old Testament and the New, do not appear to have been chosen to furnish the preacher with an opportunity of displaying his talents on particular topics which he had rendered familiar to his mind, but to enable him, in the fulness of a pious spirit, through the medium of a vigorous understanding, to inculcate such awful truths of revelation, as should influence the hearts and lives of his hearers. To accomplish this purpose they are admirably adapted, and we cannot but wonder that they had not long since been sent into the world. In giving them publicity at present, the Religious Tract Society have acted in a manner worthy of their character; and the honour they confer on the name of the deceased, will in due proportion be reflected on themselves. Young as Mr. Spencer was when called from time into eternity, his sermons evince a mind imbued with genuine piety, accompanied with talents which must every where command respect. The lapse of time would have enlarged his sphere of knowledge in divine things, and, as a natural consequence, have increased his usefulness. He had already attained a maturity of judgment far beyond the number of his years; and had that life, which, through a mysterious dispensation of Providence, was sud denly brought to a termination, been prolonged to the common longevity of man, we might at this day have hailed him as an honour to the pulpit, and viewed him inheriting an exalted rank among the celebrated divines of the present age. 261 Review.-Memoir of the Rev. Matthew Henry. servations on the importance of reading | the Holy Scriptures, and exposes to public view many unworthy motives from which, it is to be feared, a vast number engage in this solemn duty. This is accompanied with suitable directions as to the spirit in which it should be performed, and the object that should always be kept in view. Throughout the following sections, the whole being eleven in number, no deviation in principle, no laxity in its application, is perceptible. The fair writer, on the contrary, enters fully into the spiritual import of the sacred word, and uniformly inculcates the necessity of its influence on our hearts and lives. Under this impression, she places man's moral inability to turn to God, in a scriptural light, and hence infers the aid of the Holy Spirit as essential to a saving acquaintance with Him. It must not, however, be inferred from the preceding observations, that this is a book of profound research, or one that deviates from the common track of devotional compositions. The ground on which the writer takes her stand, has been occupied by thousands, and is open to every eye; but being the high road to salvation, the charms of novelty are rendered wholly unnecessary, to attract "the weary and the heavy laden." It is a book designed for young persons who are anxious to profit by reading the scriptures, and to such it is likely to prove useful. The advice given, though derived from simple sources, is always judicious, and easy to be understood. It recommends piety of heart and life as essential to future happiness, and with an eye to this, seriously inculcates "the devotional use of the Holy Scriptures." 262 high and too distant to be affected by the voice either of friend or foe. In this view, though dead he may be considered as yet speaking, through the medium of his exalted character and bright example, which cannot be contemplated without profound veneration. Shortly after Mr. Henry's decease, a memoir of his life was published by Mr. Tong, which at that time was in much request. But the lapse of years having thrown it somewhat on the back ground of religious biography, it is at present but little known, and seldom read. In addition to the scarcity of the above work, its phraseology bears an antiquated cast, and the arrangement of the materials is not altogether adapted to our modern taste. These causes conspiring to threaten it with oblivion, induced Mr. Williams to undertake the present work, especially, as in addition to what Mr. Tong's volume contains, he could have access to many valuable documents, which appear necessary to set Mr. Henry's life and character in a deserving light. After passing through the details immediately connected with Mr. Henry's personal and family history, Mr. Williams proceeds, in subsequent chapters and sections, to delineate his private character, his strong attachment to truth, his extended benevolence, his patience under trials, and his devotedness to God. To the preceding is added an account of his various writings, which though neither so voluminous nor so diversified as those of his friend Mr. Richard Baxter, will appear gigantic, when we compare with them the pigmy productions of modern days. Interspersed throughout various parts of this volume, we find many characteristics of the times in which Mr. Henry lived. They justice taking shelter under the name and were days of trouble and perplexity, of inform of law, and of persecution reigning throughout the land with an almost unmolested triumph. The vengeful spirit of popery had not then been hushed into repose; it had even assumed a Protestant garb and many thought that "they did God service," by inflicting misery upon others, who hesitated to swallow the dogmas which power had sanctioned. A spurious liberality may cause these evil days again to return, and succeeding generations may mourn over disasters which they will have no power to remedy, The notes which are subjoined form an interesting appendage to this volume. They are of various kinds, occasionally referring to individuals, to incidental occurrences, to 263 Review. Christian Souvenir-Transubstantiation. historical facts, in the arrangement of ministerial labours, to subjects of theological discussion, and to local memoranda. A copious Index, referring to every topic of note which this work contains, closes its pages, and gives completion to the whole. Many letters written by Mr. Henry to his friends, and several specimens of his mode of preaching, have found their way into this memoir, from a perusal of which we cannot but infer, that he was "always serious in a serious cause ;"-that the importance of the office which he filled lay near his heart;-and that his great aim was to benefit those whom divine providence had committed to his care. In this he seems to have been eminently successful, and, as an honoured instrument in the hands of God in turning many to righteousness, his name is not less deserving of remembrance than for his voluminous commentary, and his various publications. The life, the writings, the character, the trials, and the labours of this eminent man, his present biographer has placed in an amiable light; but we feel convinced, that the picture he has drawn owes nothing to flattery, and but little to friendship. It is not more pleasing than it is just. In the memoir itself there are no incidents particularly remarkable; yet the biographer has contrived to keep alive the attention of the reader while passing through his pages. It is a work which embraces the memory of a laborious and faithful minister of God, whose name can never be forgotten, nor erased from the annals of the church of Christ. By revising, remodelling, enlarging, and reprinting this memoir, Mr. Williams has rescued from obscurity a valuable piece of biography that ought not to be lost, and placed it in a light in which it never before appeared. It is now brought forward from departed years, and set afloat on the stream of time flowing through the nineteenth century. In almost any hands, the name of Matthew Henry would have rendered it buoyant for a season, but the advantages it has derived from the researches, the talents, and the pen of Mr. Williams, will tend to prolong its existence, while he will have the satisfaction to "Pursue the triumph, and partake the gale." REVIEW-The Christian Souvenir; or, Reflections for every Day in the Year, selected from the Writings of approved Authors. 18mo. pp. 490. Oliphant, Edinburgh. 1829. THERE is nothing new in the construction of this book, and scarcely any thing original | 264 in any of the materials of which it is composed. To compensate, however, for this defiance to the dictates of novelty, the compiler has had recourse to the writings of eminent divines, and enriched his pages with the fruits and flowers he has culled from their compositions. By these means nearly two hundred authors are laid under contributions, and in this volume he presents to his reader the concentrated excellencies he has selected from their works. Among these writers we find the names of celebrated men, who in their day supported hostile denominations; and, although by far the greater part are of the Calvinistic school, and some few are of no contemptible celebrity in the realm of Antinomianism, it is pleasing to observe how all can unite their testimony in favour of experimental and practical godliness, when the scalping knives of controversy give place to the calumets of peace. An article being appropriated to each day throughout the year, no one is extended to any unreasonable length. Some passage of scripture is prefixed as a kind of text or motto, and the reflections which follow are generally in unison with its contents. About three or four minutes will be suffi. cient time for the perusal of the longest in the volume, and this, nothing but a suitable disposition is required, to enable every reader to spare. With the character and tendency of the sentiments inculcated, we have, on the whole, been much pleased, though about some there is a smell and tincture which bespeak their origin, and which, on a work like this, can confer no real excellence. To the pious reader, however, these peculiarities will appear too diminutive to arrest his attention: he will read what is laid before him for each day's meditation with better motives, nor will his hopes be cut off, or his expectations be disappointed. 265 Review.-A Guide to the English Language, &c. The Roman Catholics, who contend for transubstantiation, readily admit that the evidence of our senses is hostile to the fact; but this they conceive, instead of militating against its certainty, furnishes a stronger ground for the operation of faith. Against sophistry so palpable, all argument must be useless; and if, in defiance of such evidence as the dictates of our understandings, the testimony of our senses, and the result of philosophical experiments, afford, we can believe that to be a fact which every legitimate means of information attests to be a falsehood, there can be no ground of cer. tainty within the empire of existence. By many able writers, this monstrous absurdity, with others of the papal church, has been repeatedly exposed; but while this dogma, "The more repugnant to sense, the stronger is our faith in embracing it," retains its hold on the minds of the deluded devotees, the reasoning powers of an archangel would be exerted in vain. In this volume Mr. Cowley has brought his formidable artillery to bear upon these hideous edifices which superstition has raised, and to the force of his cannonade nothing but a papal understanding can be invulnerable. Many of his arguments have been long in use during the ancient, protracted, and now revived papal controversy. These still remain unrefuted, and while the dogmatism of that antichristian church supplies the place of reasoning, it would be both unnecessary and unwise for its learned doctors to risk the issue of a contention on these points, in the field of doubtful controversy. The interpretations also which Mr. Cowley has given to the passages of scripture by which these disgusting propositions are presumed to be supported, have but little claim to originality. He has, however, given concentration both to the argument and authority which he has produced, and condensed within a narrow compass, the substance of many voluminous publications. To the Protestant reader this book will operate as an antidote against the sorceries of popery; and such as are wavering in a state of indecision, its reasonings and arguments will enable to determine on the side of scripture and of truth. To the genuine sons, however, of old mother church, though long afflicted with one of the plagues of Egypt, all that he has collected and advanced will be of no avail. To them it would be much the same, whether the horse had eaten the millstone, or the millstone had eaten the horse. The declarations of the church, and the dictates of a council grown mouldy with age, would have been 266 the determining point, and simple credulity would as readily swallow the one as the other. REVIEW.-A Gentleman's Guide to the THOUGH called a second edition, this is in In this work, Mr. Sutcliffe has collated modern grammar with the most ancient sources of Gothic, Scandinavian, and Saxon lore; and largely so with Latin, German, and French grammars. This has led him, in some places, to launch out too much into universal grammar. But, at the same time, it rewards the reader by amplitude of ideas; for on collating it with Mr. Murray's, we find, almost at every page, an accession of rich and instructive remarks. In the declension of the noun, we have the true distinction between the Gothic of or off, and the Latin preposition de, as written in the words Davidoff, Peteroff, &c. as also the more frequent form of the genitive case, Davides son. To this a note is added, of the declensions of the noun in the Sapponic grammar by Fiellstrom, by which it appears that they have nine variations of case. These are collated with the older forms of the Latin, as in the ancient Roman tables, and with the Greek. On the definitive article the, Mr. S. accounts for the want of it among the Romans, and the paucity of its use among the Goths, on the ground of the numerous and luminous character of their declensions. Ex. Toga mulieris, a robe of the woman; Toga muliebris, the robe of the woman: by them no article was wanted. In the Gothic gospels of Ulphilus, we find in but a few places sa for the masculine, and only in three places so for the feminine. We sometimes find thai for the plural, and latterly tha. On this head Mr. S. presumes that we have left the longer sound of the plural article behind, which the French have preserved in le and les, and the Germans in der and die. This is a capital defect in the English language. The ex 267 Review.-The Stepmother. amples he adduces are, "The righteous shall flourish as the palm-tree." "The just shall live by faith." Both these examples we understand in the plural, as the wise the brave-the good; whereas, on reference to the Hebrew and Greek, we find the words in the singular, tzadick and dicaios. On the contrary, Matt. xiii. 43, "The righteous shall shine as the sun," dicaioi, the righteous in the plural number. All this confusion might be avoided by a recurrence to the longer and shorter article, and if not admitted in the colloquial, we might at least write the and the or thei. On the verb, nine pages are bestowed in the illustration of the modes and tenses, and of the auxiliaries. We find also a copious note of the primitive form of cer. tain verbs in the Gothic, the Swedish, and the Saxon tongues; and in the appendices, three tables of the time of the verb by our Harris, by the Abbe Girard, and by Beauzée. He declines the term "second future tense," for "the future relative tense." Ex. "When this corruption shall have put on incorruption;" the future here having relation to the precise time of the resurrection. He complains, p. 46, that by leaving behind the termination of the verb in n, an, en, o, er, or, ere, though we have gained a shade of uniformity in orthography, we have at the same time lost the primitive distinction between the infinitive and active structure of the verb. Ex. Bita nagot litel i sonder, "to bite any little (thing) asunder;" Iag biter, "I bite." Thus, in the haste of excision, we have left many excellencies. On the subject of adverbs, conjunctions, and prepositions, very many difficulties occur in the classifications. The fact is, in the earliest traces of ancient grammar there existed but three divisions of words, the noun, the 'verb, and the particle or indeclinable parts of speech. By consequence, many words were used as adjectives, as adverbs, and as prepositions. Some of those difficulties remain to the present day. However, on collating the illustrations of our author, with other English grammars, the reader will find much light thrown upon the particles, which he seems to have gleaned in a vast course of reading, and long protracted studies. The syntax of this grammar is the most interesting part. It opens with many preparatory hints to study and understand the rules. The principles of concord, propriety, and government, are illustrated by phrases and simple sentences, which cannot be misunderstood. 268 In Rule xviii, he enters at some length on a defence of the subjunctive mood, and vindicates the example in Dr. Lowth, "We shall overtake him, though he run," and the phrase in Dr. Blair, "It must be the preacher's own fault, if he transgress in unity." We cannot say here, "will run," because we cannot foretell, nor can we say, "shall run," because we cannot command; therefore, “should run,” must be the auxiliary understood. He objects in the second example, to transgresses, because it fills the language with a superabundance of sibilancy, of which the French is happily relieved. Ex. Si Mentor me quit, "If Mentor quit me." After supporting this doctrine with twenty examples, down from the Saxon age to the present time, he concludes by accounting for the disregard of the subjunctive form, in most writers, in the following manner: "Dr. John Wallis, Savilian professor of geometry in the University of Oxford, an elegant Latin writer on English Grammar, Logic, &c., having denied the existence of the subjunctive mood, and by consequence the influence of the conjunction, induced many of his pupils, and others who became great writers during the reign of queen Anne, to follow his example. Before his time we scarcely find any who had ventured to take that liberty with the language."—p. 268. many amusing remarks, with seven speciThe Cratylus of primitive words contains mens of the changes induced on the English tongue; to which is added, an essay of Plato's master, to whom he dedicates on composition. The Cratylus, (the name his book on names) though brief, is very interesting in Swedish antiquities, and in proofs that all the languages of the present world have emanated from the family of Noah. The proofs he adduces are from professor Ihve of Sweden, who, according to Dupin, has demonstrated that the Gothic, the Hebrew, and the ancient Persic, is from sir William Jones, who asserts, are sister languages. The next testimony [Disc. vi.] that all the languages of India have proceeded from a common language Sutcliffe conceives that this Iran is the spoken in the ancient empire of Iran. Mr. Erak of the French writers, and derived from the Erech of Moses, Gen. xi. one of the first four cities of Noah's family. REVIEW.-The Stepmother, a Tragedy in five Acts, by Jacob Jones, Esq. of the Inner Temple. Hurst, London, 1829. OUR dramatic compositions have of late been so polluted with profaneness but ill concealed, with licentiousness scarcely disguised, and with pernicious principles that are almost recommended by the polite manner in which they are reprobated, |