aside the historical sense, much less considered it untrue; but it looked on the acts and circumstances of the persons described as done by themselves, and ordered by Providence, with an express reference to the acts of Christ, and the circumstances of his body, the Church, as regulated more by the laws of the unseen, than by those of the material world, the world of time and space. This sense is only to be understood by those whose sight was purged by austere life. It is the wisdom which S. Paul spoke among them that are perfect." To those whose hearts are absorbed in the world, it seems folly and fatuity. Relish for mystical exposition is the sure test of the spiritual mind.—pp. 61, 62. 66 And then he proceeds to mention that this mystical and allegorical method obtained chiefly among the monks. I trust it is unnecessary to stop to consider the consequences of such a system, nor can it be needful to point out the fallacies by which it is here sought to be advocated. If the grammatical sense of Holy Scripture be addressed only to the intellect, and the allegorical to faith, it is plain that faith does not consist in believing the written testimony of God,— but some far-fetched and recondite meaning of it,— or rather no meaning of it at all, but some application which has no other source than the fancy of the expositor, or, it may be, fancies, for a thousand · allegories, applications, and mystical expositions equally remote from each other and from the text, may be drawn from one and the same passage by a lively imagination. Further on, this author informs us that the Old Testament, " IF NOT MADE CHRISTIAN BY ALLEGORY, IS, AFTER ALL, NO MORE THAN JEWISH HISTORY." To expose the infinite presumption and profaneness of such a sentence must be needless in a Christian country. I cannot, however but avow my conviction that not any one, nor all put together, of the false and dangerous doctrines this party are endeavouring to disseminate, by means of these lives of the Saints and other works, is comparable with this. It does, as I have already observed, lay the axe to the very root of allsound theology, and sow the seeds of every sort and degree of heresy and error. But, in fact, it is itself a falsehood so pervading-so utterly alterative of the whole mind into which it is received, that it destroys the power of discriminating truth and falsehood. For this, as it has been most truly observed in one of the most important pamphlets (if one measures not by bulk, but by the mode in which the subject is treated) which has appeared in the course of the Tractarian Controversy,—is one of the worst effects of this allegorizing system. Those who habitually employ their minds in the study and generation of what is imaginary, are but too likely to lose sight of the real nature and just value of truth."* This is the prime error of this party, and, 66 * A Letter to a Friend on the Tract for the Times, No. 89. By the Rev. S. R. Maitland, (London, Rivington, 1841,) p. 17. It is hard to imagine a greater service to the cause of truth as far as a mistake and false position, irrespective of wrong principles, can be, it is the source and fountain of all their other errors. To what lengths they are now disposed to go in their tampering with Holy Scripture has been shown by a work published a year ago by the Rev. F. Oakeley, "The Life of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, from the Latin of St. Bonaventure, newly translated for the use of members of the Church of England." The whole object of that work is, to teach people to turn the history of our blessed Redeemer into poetry and romance,- —a process which Mr. Oakeley calls Meditation. There was a time when clergymen of the Church of England would have turned with horror from such an employment. But there is no limit to the mischief men do themselves by indulging in a habit of tampering with truth. Nor, when people have sufficiently confused their minds to relish this allegorical and mystical mode of interpretation,and have learned to regard the Old Testament as no better than Jewish history, till they have made it Christian by their allegories and meditations,—is it than would be conferred by the learned author of this excellent pamphlet pursuing the subject at the length and detail it requires, a task which no one living is better qualified to perform. The subject of the interpretation of Scripture, and of the prophecies in particular, has been involved in such confusion by Mr. Newman and his party-for example, in his Sermons on Subjects of the Day-that a work from such a pen as Mr. Maitland's, vindicating the true and only principle of interpretation, and unravelling the sophistries of this school, is exceedingly needed at the present moment. in the least surprising, that they should proceed to take the New Testament in hand also;-rather it would be wonderful if they did not. For,-as Mr. Maitland observed, long before things had got to the height they have now reached,-one of the injurious effects which flows from this allegorical mode of interpretation is this;-"It leads men to tamper with the word of God, and either by addition, suppression, or some tortuous proceeding or other, to make it agree with their imagination."* And, in like man ner, I may add, this taste for writing legends prepares the mind for treating the Bible in the same manner;—and what the next step will be, it is not very difficult to prognosticate: when lives of Saints take the place of romances and fairy tales," (as the author of the Life of St. Gilbert speaks, though with little seeming consciousness that this is what he and his friends are labouring to effect,) one can readily guess the result likely to follow from the publication of myths and legends. Most correctly does the same biographer describe (though apparently without a thought of the application which may be made of his words) the manner in which this is brought about. They who consider the saints in a dreamy way, will hardly be able to do more than dream that there has been upon earth One, who was and is Man-God, for the lives of saints are shadows of His, and help to interpret His actions * Ibid., who is incomprehensible. They who look upon the saints as mere personages in religious romance, will be apt to look on Christianity as a beautiful philosophy.-St. Gilbert, p. 130. Mr. Oakeley's translation of Bonaventure's Life of Christ proves how soon men become insensible to the evil of such proceedings, when once they suffer themselves to trifle with truth. One would have thought, the feelings of reverence, which his party have so long claimed to possess almost exclusively, would have made him withdraw his hand, when he was tempted to give to English readers a work which pretends to supply what God has thought proper to conceal. But no. He is aware of the objection. He states it. He labours in his introduction to answer it. This is his defence: But let the reader who may be inclined to object boldness to our Saint's devout speculations, consider well with himself, first, whether he have himself ever meditated, strictly speaking, upon points in the Sacred History; i. e. proposed some event in our Lord's Life on earth, say his Nativity, or His Temptation, or His Passion, as an object of direct, and, as far as might be, undistracted contemplation for a certain period of time? If that period have been as short as five or ten minutes only, let him farther reflect whether he have not brought the solemn transaction home to his mind by the help of innumerable particulars, and even collateral incidents, for the proof of which he would find it hard indeed to lay his hand upon any text of Holy Scripture. If the subject of his meditation were the Nativity, for instance, whence, I ask, did he derive the parti culars of his idea (for definite idea he must have formed) |