B. ENGLISH AND AMERICAN WORKS.

THE MOSAIC ACCOUNT OF CREATION, THE MIRACLE OF TO-DAY; or, New Witnesses to the Oneness of Genesis and Science. By Charles B. Warring. 16mo. pp. 292. New York; J. W. Schermerhorn and Co. 1875.

That the first two chapters of Genesis bear the positive impress of divine inspiration we should hold with the author of this book, Whether with him we should call the production a miracle or not, would depend upon the definition of that word. Our author takes the view that the Mosaic account of creation is intensely literal, and compares it to the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah. The words of the prophet awaited the tragedy of the crucifixion for their full explanation. Likewise the sublime sentences which introduce us to the current of biblical doctrine and history have awaited the development of material sciences in the nineteenth century to reveal the extent of their super-human wisdom. That an account of the creation should be adapted to the wants of the world, both in the times of the Jewish commonwealth and in this age of scientific discovery is, to say the least, marvellous.

This adaptation to diverse conditions of civilization could be secured in two ways; of which one is to use language in so pregnant a sense that it should be capable of expanding in meaning as science developed. This is the theory of our author. By reading between the lines he believes he can put the whole body of modern science into the first two chapters of Genesis.

Another means of securing the remarkable adaptation of which we have spoken might be to use language such that all questions of mere science could be kept out of it. We surmise this latter plan would require as much and as direct divine supervision as the first; and that it is probably the plan which inspiration has pursued. Our author, on page forty-three, compares the record of creation to "that kind of history styled Annals.” It is suggested to us on high authority that, "Memorabilia" would be a better word.

The main design of the Mosaic introduction is so manifest that it seems to us unwise to dissect too minutely the language which expresses it. Dissection is likely to do to a sentence what it does to an animal — destroy the life of it. Is it not more and more evident from the investigations in the valley of the Euphrates, whence Abraham emigrated, that the costume of the Mosaic cosmogony is that of the Chaldaean legends, but shorn of their polytheism and their innumerable absurdities? The Mosaic introduction asserts, both in general and in detail, that one God is the creator of all things, and emphasises his personality. It was to bear witness to that idea that Abraham left his fatherland. How this idea of the divine unity and personality is bound up in the passage as a whole, independent of the word designating God, appears in a substitution our

.....

author makes of "Natural Causes" for "God" (p. 156). "In the beginning Natural Causes created the heavens and the earth. And the Spirit of Natural Causes moved upon the face of the waters. And Natural Causes said, Let there be light, and there was light. And Natural Causes saw the light, that it was good,” etc.

But we must close our review with regret, simply remarking that the author is reverent, ingenious, and familiar with all the varied tools he uses. We hesitate about accepting his method of interpretation and adjustment. We nevertheless heartily commend it to the attention of all who are making a special study of the subject treated of.

G. F. W.

THE RELIGION OF EVOLUTION. By M. J. Savage, Author of "Christianity the Science of Manhood."

Brooks, and Company. 1876.

pp. 253. Boston: Lockwood,

We confess that we have not read this book through. We have, however, read sufficiently in it (one hundred and thirty pages) to ascertain that the author has a very inadequate and distorted view of the orthodox system of theology. We are heartily sorry both for him and for the Bible, when he attempts to state its doctrines and their relations to the hopes of the great body of Christian believers. What dissuaded us from farther perusal of the book has been the research upon which we were sent to test the credibility of the hypothesis by which the author reconciles the existence of evil with the goodness of God. It seems that we have been beside ourselves in thinking there really was any such thing as evil at all. Even the word itself, like Enoch of old, is not; for our author has translated it, and "all evil is nothing more nor less than maladjustment" (see p. 100). "If you can find any form of evil that cannot be wrapped up in the word 'maladjustment,' then you will find what my thinking has failed to discover" (see p. 101). We are sorry to learn, however, that “maladjustment" has been very much protracted in times past. "God is in no hurry" to get rid of it, since he has "eternity to work in,” and has, during the millenniums of the past, only now got us on to "the threshold of what is" to be (see p. 91). When maladjusted, also, man "finds disturbance, pain, calamity, sickness, death" (see p. 101). Through “maladjustment" the powers of nature are continually working men "harm" and "ruin" (see p. 102). A maladjusted location of a city like Pompeii, even though it be from ignorance, results in "calamity" which is only "on the whole beneficent," and is connected with "incidental evils" (see p. 103). "Moral evil is only moral maladjustment." "But the selfish hunger is strong, and his [man's] moral sense is weak and blind. Habit grows until it becomes a disease" (see pp. 108, 109). Furthermore, we are told that "if physical, intellectual, and moral calamities come, it will be small comfort to you to know that your own ignorance or carelessness is the devil that brings them" (see p. 110). That is just what we have always thought,

.....

and corresponds closely with the words of the prophet: "O Isracl, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me [Jehovah] is thine help." We fear that the evolution of our author will not provide so good help as was already provided for the Jews several centuries before the Christian era.

We presume our author is, without knowing it, orthodox in his views of eternal punishment; for if an omnipotent God, with eternity past to work in, has not yet eliminated all "maladjustment," we do not see what grounds we can have logically, to believe he will ever succeed in doing it. We are bound to remark still further, that we have not found any dictionaries that define the prefix "mal" by the adjective "good." We remember, however, some unpleasant remarks in scripture about certain persons who called it good; but, we are glad to say, they have never been successful in giving the usage currency.

To be serious, it is not the least of the merits of orthodoxy that it is manly, and calls things by their right names. It faces difficulties and mysteries with as little resort as possible to words which may, indeed, 66 wrap up" the truth, but never can unfold it.

R.

HOW ARE THE Dead raised, AND WITH WHAT BODY DO THEY COME? An Inquiry into the Doctrine of the Resurrection of the Dead, as taught in the New Testament; with particular reference to the Question of a Future Existence of the Human Body. By John Hall, late Principal of the Ellington School. 16mo. pp. 216. Hartford: Brown and Gross; Elmira, N. Y.: Hall Brothers. 1875.

Hon. John Hall, the author of this volume, died October 2, 1847. He wrote the treatise with great care scveral years before his death. It is now published by his surviving children.

The theory of Judge Hall is, that the dead body will not be raised to life, but that the soul," a truly substantial and organic being," will rise and live forever. This soul is a "spiritual mass," an organic mass, and is therefore called a "spiritual body"; and after the death of the "material mass" it will exist, “relieved from a cumbrous load of impediments.” Without adopting the author's theory we may say that he has expressed it clearly and defended it ingeniously. He was a conscientious and independent thinker. In his style he follows the laws of logic rather more carefully than those of usage.

MESSIANIC PROPHECY: its Origin, Historical Character, and Relation to New Testament Fulfilment. By Dr. Edward Riehm, Professor of Theology, Halle. Translated from the German, with the approbation of the Author, by the Rev. John Jefferson. 16mo. pp. 266. Edinburgh T. and T. Clark; New York: Scribner, Welford, and Armstrong. 1876.

Prof. Riehm is well known to our readers as an evangelical and excel

lent, as well as learned, theologian. His present volume lacks the unity and completeness which would have belonged to it, if he had originally designed to publish it as a treatise by itself. It is a collection of Articles published in successive numbers of the Studien und Kritiken. It is a valuable work, and merits a careful study.

PRIESTHOOD IN the Light oF THE NEW TESTAMENT. The Congregationalist Union Lecture for 1876. By E. Mellor, D.D. 8vo. pp. 423. New York, Chicago, and New Orleans: A. S. Barnes and Company. 1876.

Under the term "priesthood" Dr. Mellor includes "not merely the function of offering gifts and sacrifices unto God, but any form of official mediation between man and God by which it is assumed that, in virtue of ordination or any exterior rite whatever, certain persons acquire prerogatives which enable them, exclusively, to dispense salvation to others " (p. 3). Dr. Mellor aims to show that the New Testament acknowledges no such priesthood (1) in name; (2) in office; (3) in specified qualifications; and (4) that "such priesthood is precluded by the whole genius of the Christian dispensation" (p. 12). Having shown that there are only two offices in the Christian church, that of presbyters and that of deacons, — and that the office of bishops is identical with that of presbyters, Dr. Mellor proceeds to examine "some of those functions which the Christian priesthood, falsely so called, assume to possess the exclusive prerogative of discharging." He aims to show that there is no warrant for the pretension of Christian ministers to perform priestly functions at the altar and the confessional. His arguments will not be accepted by the Romanists, the high-church Episcopalians, and many Lutherans, but will receive the decided approval of the Baptists, Presbyterians, and Congregationalists. Dr. Mellor writes with perspicuity and vigor. His treatise will be highly prized by candid men, whether they fully agree with him

or not.

THE SCRIPTURAL HARMONY BETWEEN PRIVATE JUDGMENT AND CHURCH AUTHORITY, as chiefly apparent from the Four Gospels. By Rev. William Maw Shaw, M.A., Vicar of Yealand Conyers 12mo. pp. 271. London: Simpkin, Marshall, and Company; Manchester: J. E. Cornish. 1874.

The author of this volume is a Calvinistic and devout Episcopalian. He opposes ritualism, but is a thorough "churchman," as the English use the word. He defends, on biblical grounds, the right of private judgment; defends the Athanasian Creed; defends a high, but not the ritualistic, theory of the sacraments; condemns the practice of auricular confession; condemns also the high church theory of the priesthood, yet justifies the use of the term " priest " as designating a church officer. The volume is an

instructive one, and gains our respect for its author. It differs in many particulars from the work, noticed above, of Dr. Mellor, but agrees with it on some of the fundamental questions relating to ecclesiastical polity and forms.

MOSES: A BIBLICAL STUDY. By J. J. Van Oosterzee, D.D., Author of "Year of Salvation," etc. Translated from the Dutch by James Kennedy, B.D. 12mo. pp. 362. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark; New York: Scribner, Welford and Armstrong. 1876.

Dr. Van Oosterzee has a happy talent for exhibiting the practical truths suggested by the biblical histories. He does this with great simplicity and neatness. He does not depend, like Dr. Guthrie, on illustrations from modern history; nor, like Melville, on a rhetorical structure of sentences. He has little or no illustration; and pays but little attention to rhetorical artifices; but he is easy, natural, devout; instructive also, and impressive.

THE WORD OF LIFE; being Selections from the Work of a Ministry. By Charles J. Brown, D.D., Edinburgh. pp. 330. New York: Robert Carter and Brothers. 1874.

When he published this volume Dr. Brown had been for thirty-six years the pastor of the Free North Church, in Edinburgh. The volume is in many respects uncommonly interesting. It contains good specimens of the author's habitual method of preaching. He enforces truth with much solemnity, plainness, and power. He adopts the style which was common in this country one and two hundred years ago, but is less common now. This is especially noticeable in his words on the atonement. For instance, he says, in his sixteenth sermon, that "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, having borne that curse-being made the curse of the law for us" (p. 206). "The righteous God will bring his curse on no guiltless one. It may be questioned whether he will ever bring suffering of any kind on one absolutely guiltless. But it is certain he will not bring his curse on the guiltless...... There was a mysterious manner, yet most real and true, in which Christ was not guiltless, — yea, in which he who alone in all the world was without sin was, to speak with the deepest reverence, of all guilty ones in the world the guiltiest" (p. 207) "Thus did he, to speak with profoundest reverence, deserve and behove to endure the divine curse-due to the blasphemies and persecutions of Saul; to the aggravated denials of Peter; to the crimes of the thief who hung on the cross beside him; to the unnumbered iniquities of all who shall be saved by him to the end of the world” (p. 209). "Ah, they [certain opposers of Dr. Brown's theory] are blind to what is the very soul and glory of the gospel, that Christ, in a mysterious sense, yet most real, was the guiltiest of all, that the Lord did verily lay on him the