in the ashes of the temple he had burned, while others wept at the glory that was gone. But it only marks a period of transition. No nation, and least of all a German people, can rest in it. Let it not be supposed Strauss is an exponent of the German school of theology or religion, as it is sometimes unwisely urged. He is a single element in a vast mass. His work finds opponents in the leaders of the three great Protestant theological parties in Germany. The main body of theologians there is represented by Schleiermacher, Tholuck, Neander, De Wette, and men of a similar spirit. Strauss is the representative of a small party. He is by no means the representative of the followers of Hegel, many of whom are opposed to him.* The whole book has the savor of Pantheism pervading it, as we think, using Pantheism in its best sense, if our readers can find a good sense for it. He does not admit a personal God, we are told, and, therefore, would not admit of a personal Christ, or incarnation of God. This, we suspect, is the sole cause of his aversion to personalities. But he nowhere avows this openly and plainly; we, therefore, only give it as our conjecture, though Tholuck openly calls him a Pantheist of the school of Hegel, defining that school " Atheistic;" while Ullmann brings the same charge, but with much more modesty, asking men to translate it more mildly if they can. We are not surprised at the sensation Mr. Strauss has excited in Germany, nor at the number of replies, which have been showered down upon him. Destruction always makes a great noise, and attracts the crowd, but nobody knows when the Gospels were published, and the world, doubtless, was in no great haste to receive them. It is fortunate the book has been written in the only country where it can be readily answered. We have no fears for the final result. Doubtless, some will be shaken in their weakly rooted faith; and the immediate effect will probably be bad; worse than former religious revolutions with them. The Rationalists took possession of the pulpit, but unlike Strauss, says Mr. Tholuck, they pulled down no churches. But we have no fear that any church will be destroyed by him. If a church can be destroyed by a criticism, or a book, however *See, for example, an article on the second volume of the "Leben Jesu," in the Berlin "Jahrbucher für Wissenschaftliche Kritik," for 1836. Band I. p. 681, seq., by Rosenkrantz. pungent, the sooner it falls the better. A church, we think, was never written down, except by itself. To write down the Christian Church seems to us as absurd as to write down the solar system, or put an end to tears, joys, and prayers. Still less have we any fear, that Christianity itself should come to an end, as some appear to fancy; a form of Religion, which has been the parent and the guardian of all modern civilization; which has sent its voice to the ends of the world; and now addresses equally, the heart of the beggar and the monarch; which is the only bond between societies; an institution, cherished and clung to by the choicest hopes, the deepest desires of the human race, is not in a moment to be displaced by a book. "There has long been a fable among men," says an illustrious German writer," and even in these days is it often heard; unbelief invented it, and little-belief has taken it up. It runs thus; there will come a time, and, perhaps, it has already come, when it will be all over with this Jesus of Nazareth; and this is right. The memory of a single man is fruitful only for a time. The human race must thank him for much; God has brought much to pass through him. But he is only one of us, and his hour to be forgotten will soon strike. It has been his earnest desire to render the world entirely free; it must, therefore, be his wish to make it free also from himself, that God may be all in all. Then men will not only know that they have power enough in themselves to obey perfectly the will of God; but in the perfect knowledge of this, they can go beyond its requisitions, if they only will! Yea, when the Christian name is forgotten, then for the first time shall an universal kingdom of Love and Truth arise, in which there shall lie no more any seed of enmity, that from the beginning has been continually sown between such as believe in Jesus, and the children of men. But this fable can never be true. Ever, since the day that he was in the flesh, the Redeemer's image has been stamped ineffaceably on the hearts of men. Even if the letter should perish, which is holy, only because it preserves to us this image, the image itself would remain forever. It is stamped so deep in the heart of man, that it never can be effaced, and the word of the Apostle will ever be true, 'Lord, whither shall we go? thou only hast the words of eternal life.'” * - *While we have been preparing these pages, we have sometimes glanced at another book, attacking Christianity. Its title is Jesus-Christ ART. II. The Foundation of Christianity in the Wants of the Soul; being the Dudleian Lecture, delivered before the University in Cambridge, May 13th, 1840. By the Rev. W. B. O. PEABODY. JOHN IV. 14. -THE WATER THAT I SHALL GIVE HIM SHALL BE IN HIM A WELL OF WATER SPRINGING UP UNTO EVERLASTING LIFE. THE subject assigned for this lecture is Revealed Religion; and the purpose of the Founder, as I understand it, was, to provide for such a discussion of the subject, as should tend to confirm the hearers in their conviction of the truth of Christianity. The original evidences of the religion of Jesus Christ, I shall not now bring before you. That subject is in abler hands than mine. I shall content myself with making some suggestions, which, so far as they have any weight, will strengthen the confidence that our religion shall endure, and that the gates of hell, - that is, the councils of destruction, shall not prevail against it. - Our Saviour in conversing with the Samaritan woman, compared his religion to a living fountain within the breast. Because it is internal it shall not perish like outward and visible things. This is the emphatic part of the sentence, it shall be in him, and because it is in him it shall continue to flow forever. We cannot be supposed to feel what the power of that illustration was in a climate where the broad rivers shrank to silver threads, and the earth was parched and blackened by the summer sun. But the truth which it conveys, and the promise which it contains within it, are clear to every eye, et Sa doctrine, Histoire de la Naissance de l'Eglise, de son organization et de ses progrès, pendant le premier siècle, par J. Salvador. Paris: 1838. 2 vol. 8vo.; a work of great pretensions and very little merit. Unfortunately another attack upon Christianity has fallen into our hands, with the title, Examen du Mosaisme et du Christianisme, par M. Reghellini de Schio. Paris: 1834. 3 vol. 8vo. If any unfortunate reader should chance, in a luckless moment, to open this book, we advise him to bathe instantly in the "living stream," and submit to all the Levitical purifications; for a book more unclean and hateful was never devised, by mortal man, we trust. We have cut only three or four of its infamous leaves; but have felt a frightful sense of defilement ever since touching it. Only stupidity, uncleanness, and impiety, could have produced a work so vile. the promise that religion, being an internal principle, shall not share the fate of those things which perish with the using, and pass away. The same thing which makes it permanent in single hearts, ensures its perpetual duration in the world; and in times when the moral aspect of the world indicates strong tendencies to infidelity, such a promise, based on a familiar truth, serves to encourage the hopes of believers. But whence comes this confidence? Why are we so sure that the stream which our Saviour drew from the rock in the wilderness will never cease to flow? Do we think that the hope of heaven and the fear of hell will always make men Christians? Do we suppose that many who reject Christianity now, will be driven to it for consolation in their dark and troubled hours? Or do we take encouragement from beholding how it has grown out of small beginnings, and overspread the civilized world? No doubt these things help our confidence. But the foundation of it is, that man wants Christianity; there is a thirst in the soul which no other element will supply. He must turn to some invisible power above him; he cannot confine his aspirations to the beings about him, and the present world. Having these wants, he cannot give up Christianity, the only religion which professes to supply them, or even acknowledges their existence. By the unquestionable testimony of works, which no one could do unless God were with him, Jesus assures him that he is divinely sent to the world, sent on purpose to supply this hunger and thirst of the soul for more than man and this earth can give. We so often speak of communicating religion to others, and of receiving it from others, that we sometimes forget that the feelings and desires addressed by Christianity are all natives of the heart. They are in us from the first, folded up and dormant, certainly, but still they are there. The same inspiration which gave us life and understanding, gave us those capacities, to which the word of inspiration appeals. Every man has a power to discern distinction between good and evil; between the right and the wrong. Every man, too, has those powers, which are called spiritual; which, when awakened to action, make him acquainted with unseen or spiritual, as the bodily senses make him acquainted with material and visible things. There is in every soul from the beginning something which tends to look forward to a hereafter, and upward to a power above. The language which we use on this subject deceives us, as language is apt to do. When we teach others, our children, for example, we say it is to inspire religious feelings in their hearts. The feelings are there already; and it is our part to educate or draw them into action, and to direct them to the subjects which ought to engage them. We can do little more than point out the way. It is God who gives them the power to go. Religious education is the training of those spiritual powers and affections, which reside in every breast; which lie folded in the young, and in the thoughtless and hardened of our race are not dead, but sleeping; which, if we call upon them, arise and answer to the summons of a friendly voice; but which, if not called into action from without by some being who is interested in their welfare, may lie unexerted till the trumpet wakes the dead. This, then, is the truth, that the religious feeling lies deep in our nature, ready to welcome the disclosures of Christianity as soon as it knows that God has sent them from above. You appeal to the moral sense and the religious feeling in others; and their moral sense and religious feeling start up from their deathlike slumber. When you bring your children to reflect upon the subject, it is not an external process, the work is done within, for well does inspiration say, that the fountain of devotion must be in him, within the man, or it cannot flow unto everlasting life. When you go to some poor hardened wretch, and try to touch his heart, you feel that your words are powerless, and that nothing you can say will make the least impression; yet at that very moment, perhaps, the religious feeling is waking; it is something within himself, which rises up and masters him; his fierce defiance sinks away, his tears begin to fall,his own spirit is in action and will do the rest; for to wake him to a sense of his guilt and danger is all that you can do. A great and inspiring truth this! that the thirst for religion is born in the human breast. Stifled and suppressed it may be, stifled and suppressed indeed it is; buried deep both in single hearts and great communities, under a crushing weight of meaner interests and passions. Still it is there; and had we a divining rod for the purpose, we could find the living spring under all the worldliness that surrounds us. We are told that engineers are now sounding the Asiatic deserts with Artesian. wells; and they are sure to find the element far down beneath the sands that are whitened by the suns of ages. And those, |