have not yet been published, which are to obviate the defects of the mode of building hitherto practised, and to afford greater security against fire; and, however injurious this delay may be to many an unsheltered family, it may be easily accounted for, without imputing blame to the government, which has to contend with innumerable obstacles in the introduction of any, even the most useful, innovation. The houses taken from the Catholic Armenians, at the time of the persecution, most of which are in ruins, have been restored to them."

The signs in the sun, and zodiacal lights, and aurora borealis of last year, must be vividly fresh in the minds of most of our readers. And, still more recently, very remarkable phenomena have been observed both in America and in Europe." New York, August 18, 1831. The sun, yesterday afternoon, from half past five until seven o'clock, presented a singular and unpleasant aspect. The whole surface was green, as the sea water or Brazilian emerald, emitting not a single beam. Such, also, was the state of the heavens, as to create an optical delusion. The great orb of light seemed to have left the skies; and to hang in our own atmosphere suspended, like a balloon, at no very great distance from the earth.""This city (Genoa) has lately presented, almost daily, some solar phenomenon. A zodiacal light, which lengthened the day one hour, continued from the 4th to the 12th instant (August 1831). Another celestial phenomenon, not less remarkable, appeared on the 9th. Towards five o'clock in the afternoon, a light cloud of vapours suddenly covered the horizon, and enveloped the sun. It was at once beautiful and curious to see the luminary of day laying aside his dazzling brightness, appear in the firmament as behind a light veil, presenting its disc to the sight of every spectator. First it was like an immense globe of limpid crystal; it afterwards assumed a shade of rose colour, and at last a delicate violet. Five or six large black spots could be easily discerned by the eye; one of them on the upper edge of the planet; the others nearly in the centre, at a short distance from each other. This phenomenon lasted above an hour."

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But the greatest and most conclusive present sign of the speedy coming of the Lord, is that fearful pestilence which, having swept across the breadth of the world, hath now reached our shores. "O Lord, I have heard thy speech, and was afraid : O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years in wrath, remember mercy. God came from Teman. His glory covered the heavens; and the earth was full of his praise. Before him went the pestilence, and burning coals went forth at his feet. He stood and measured the earth: he beheld, and drove asunder the nations. Thou didst march through the land in indignation; thou didst thresh the heathen in anger. Thou wentest forth for the salvation of thy people, even for salvation with thine

anointed." (Hab. iii.) This fearful disease is said to have been generally preceded by earthquakes in India; and in the present year, when it reached Vienna, was preceded by a violent hurricane. And the Prussian State Gazette says, "During the past summer, and particularly in the month of July, it had been noticed that the water of the Baltic had acquired an extraordinary degree of heat, which frequently exceeded that of the air. From this phenomenon, and from many others, naturalists have drawn the conclusion, that there is a general derangement of the earth, which may have produced the miasma which has manifested itself in so many quarters."

Ten years ago it was observed, that this cholera travelled in the teeth of the monsoon, at the rate of ten miles a day, shewing it was not in the atmosphere. From every thing we have heard respecting this disease, it seems more like some destroying angel sent by God, than any thing that has appeared in modern times; and it would seem to be final, for it is generally admitted that it has never been eradicated from any place where it has once forced an entrance. This disease is indisputably new, and no specific for its cure has yet been discovered. It is very improperly named Cholera ; for it is a species of fever, of such virulence that it usually kills the patient in the cold fit, with which the disease begins; and the only medical hope is derived from bringing on the hot fit as soon as possible, attending at the same time to the other morbid symptoms. This fever, in addition to its greater virulence and rapidity, is appalling from its being so unsparing of rank, and so unchecked by climate. It is not, like other fevers, confined to the abodes of penury, and the impurity which want engenders, but attacks all. And it is not confined to tropical climates alone, but was raging at once at St. Petersburgh, and at Mecca; has stretched from the banks of the Ganges to the Elbe; and has shewn equal virulence on the shores of the Baltic and the Indian sea. The strong holds of Infidelity and of the Papacy, France, Italy, and Spain, have not yet been visited; and they may be reserved for the heavier and the instant doom, of burning coals beneath the feet of Jehovah. Britain, then, take warning, and humble herself before the Lord, like David at the threshing-floor of Araunah. The plague may yet be stayed, for the Lord is merciful. We may yet become an ark of safety for God's people, and witnesses for him in the midst of the judgments. But if we refuse, as a nation, to repent, God will destroy us as a nation. He will deliver those individuals who sigh and cry for the abominations done in the land, as he delivered Lot from Sodom; but all the hardened sinners will be swallowed up in one indiscriminate destruction, 66 Turn ye, turn ye: why will ye die, O sons of men !"

Let

447

DODS ON THE INCARNATION.

On the Incarnation of the Eternal Word; by the Rev. Marcus Dods, Belford.

WE have read this book with very deep interest, attracted by the great, the all-important doctrine which its title suggests, and led on by the very weighty truths with which it is enriched, though these truths are encumbered and tarnished by many mistakes and many errors. The mistakes regard doctrines which some of our friends have promulgated, and which, under a misapprehension both of the tenor and history of these doctrines, Mr. Dods opposes as a new system of theology; and the errors concern his own counter-statements, of what he regards as the true conclusions and the orthodox faith. But these very

mistakes and errors have greatly added to our interest in the book, since they have enabled us better to understand where the stumbling-block lies, which we shall endeavour to remove; and have convinced us, also, that it is possible to hold truth up to a certain point, and then stop short, or turn aside from the conclusions which seem to us direct and inevitable. This anomaly in some former writings of the kind had led us to suppose that there must have been two persons employed; one of whom perceived the truth, but did not follow out the conclusion; while another, who perceived not the truth, drew out a conclusion the very opposite of what should have followed from the premises. But this book has convinced us of our mistake; for here we find statements of fundamental doctrine perfectly correct, and yet all the deductions erroneous-some of them in flat contradiction to what has gone before.

In one particular this book is entitled to unqualified praise,—it is wholly free from personality. Mr. Dods has shewn a proper sense of the gravity and dignity which become his station as a minister and the great subject he discusses. We sincerely applaud him for the example he has thus given, and are convinced that he himself, and those who follow him in thus confining their attention to the doctrines alone without regarding the persons by whom these doctrines are promulgated, will be led into all truth; will find the reward of their forbearance in the enjoyment of peace here; and, if they follow on to know the Lord and obey his commandments, shall attain the eternal joys of the world to come.

All parties, with whom a Christian would hold controversy, are agreed in the general statements of the doctrine of the Incarnation all such persons would confess that Jesus of Nazareth was Son of the living God; all would confess that he was truly God and truly man in one person subsisting. But when we proceed to

particulars, and define what is meant by Son of God and Son of Man, and, in the terms of the Athanasian Creed, assert Christ to be both "God of the substance of the Father, begotten before the worlds, and Man of the substance of his mother, born in the world," many, who admit the general terms, shrink back from the definition. Some of these, like our first opponent in print, confessing that such is the doctrine, not only of the Athanasian but of all the Creeds, boldly reject them all, and avow their belief that Christ no more partook of the substance or nature of his mother, than an acorn does of the soil in which it is sown. Others, with less hardihood, but just as far from truth and orthodoxy, said that the body of our Lord was a new creation, totally unlike to our bodies in its properties, though similar in form. Others again, desiring to be orthodox, but ill-informed on the subject, thought that our Lord might take flesh of the substance of his mother and yet have a body such as that of Adam was before the Fall: and others, with absurdity hardly credible till their conduct avowed it, adopted with applause that outrage upon common sense which was perpetrated by a man who first published a pamphlet asserting that the body of Christ was not, and could not be, mortal, and then, because without the death of Christ there could be no atonement, published a second pamphlet to explain the meaning of the "adjective mortal" so as to make it truly applied to the death of other men, but not to the death of Christ!!! Many other such vagaries have been published, which we notice only to state that neither our time nor our limits could allow of our following such writers, to refute their nonsense, and not with any intention of classing the present work among such productions.

The orthodox doctrine on the Incarnation, and that which it has been our constant endeavour to maintain, is clearly stated and briefly argued in the preliminary observations (p. 42, &c.) which we have great pleasure in transcribing. 'That Christ was truly the Son of Mary, and took his flesh of her substance, is a most important point of Christian doctrine, and may be proved by the following arguments. If he took not a body of 'the substance of his mother, then was his whole life one con'tinued scene of deception. Not only did Mary call him her 6 son, but he called her his mother.....Now if Mary was not as truly his mother, as any other woman is the mother of her child, his recognising her as his mother, from the beginning to 'the end of his life, was in reality a deception.....Again, if he 'took not the flesh of Mary, then is he no brother, no kinsman ' of ours, and his right of redemption altogether fails. In this 6 case, he not only is not David's Son, but he is not the Son of 'Man at all, as he almost uniformly calls himself-deceptively, it must be admitted, unless Mary was truly his mother.

Neither, in this case, could we with any truth be said to be ""members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones," if in reality his body was a different substance, and derived from a 'different source, from ours. Moreover, he could not call us "brethren," any more than we can apply that appellation to the 'angels that surround the throne of God, or to the worm that creepeth in the dust. Fellow-creatures they are; but without ' an entire community of nature, our "brethren" they are not. ' And when we are required to "put on the Lord Jesus Christ," we are required to do what is not merely a moral, but a physical impossibility, if there lie between us and him the utterly 'impassable barrier of a different nature. If he took not his ' fleshly substance of the flesh of his mother, then, not being as truly man as we are, he could not fairly meet and conquer our oppressor; or, at least, his victory can give no assurance of victory to us. For, to express a very common sentiment in the 'language of Irenæus, "Had he not been man who conquered our enemy, he would not have been fairly conquered; and on the other hand, had he not been God who gave us the victory, we could hold it upon no secure tenure.' And, finally, if he 'took not flesh of the substance of Mary, then was he not truly "the woman's Seed," and the great original promise, upon 'which all subsequent promises are built, remains as yet un' fulfilled. But it is not more essential that the serpent's head 'should be bruised at all, than that it should be bruised by the ""woman's Seed." Hence if Christ was not truly and really "the" woman's Seed," then the whole foundation of our hopes fails.' p. 44.

With all this it is almost superfluous to say that we entirely agree; and also with what follows, on the necessity of maintaining that Christ took a reasonable soul, according to the Athanasian Creed. 'That our Lord had a reasonable soul, seems to be sufficiently proved by the fact that he was made man; for 'this would not be true if he had only a human body; because a 'human body is not a man, but only part of a man. The argu'ment commonly urged by the Fathers against the Apollinarians seems also to be perfectly decisive. They maintained, that there was the same reason for his taking a soul as for his 'taking a body; for the soul had sinned, and needed redemption as well as the body. Thus one of them, urging that if that ' which is inferior in man was assumed that it might be sanc❝tified by the Incarnation, for the same reason must that which ' is superior in man have been assumed, says, "If the clay was leavened and became a new mass, O ye wise ones, shall not the image be leavened and mingled with God, being deified by the Divinity?"" p. 46.

This last passage, unless taken ironically, inculcates palpable