may, and doubtless should, be supposed to have been perfectly independent in the composition. To suppose in Matthew a conscious design to represent the strict JewishChristian tendency in his view of Christ, if it were not absurd, would seriously weaken our impression of the correctness, with which his mind reflected that tendency. To be true to the objective reality, the representative mind must be undisturbed by any subjective purpose to be representative. That, which is done unconsciously, is the true expression of the age or the prevailing mode of thought, as it is of the individual character. We may properly put a purpose into the mind of the writer, as a help to ourselves in conceiving the objective purpose of the Spirit working in that mind; but this should be understood, not as exposition, but as what we may call an imposition quite legitimate in its place.

The thought of this general human agency, or these divine-human agencies, so informed with the Spirit of God, as to have a profound unity of design and of operation under all the apparent diversity, is not only delightful in itself, but fundamental in Christian theology. It is, essentially, that mystical element, which must enter into all sound theology and anthropology, as a sort of protest of the heart against the cold rigidity of logic, which can never bring God and man together, and which, in its reasonings from metaphysical pre-conceptions of either, however true to itself, and because true to itself, must ever be false to the reality.

The lack of this mystical vein might be mentioned, indeed, as a general criticism on this commentary. A defect, not by any means peculiar to this volume, but belonging to the whole school of theological thought, which it represents. It embarrasses, for example, the treatment of all incidents, which bring to view the twofold nature of the person of Christ. Where Jesus, for instance, is said to have "loved" the self-righteous young ruler, it occurs at once to take this "love" as a natural affection springing in the bosom of the Saviour by virtue of his divine-human

constitution; an emotion of sympathy stirred by the evident ingenuousness and earnestness of the young man. Why should that "touch of nature" in this beautiful incident be forbidden by the overshadowing element of divinity, with a "sovereign and gratuitous compassion, such as leads to every act of mercy on God's part (p. 280); any more than when Jesus weeps at the grave of Lazarus? Here is a lurking defect in the conception of the person of Christ; arising really from an excess of metaphysical precision; a failure to reach and retain the idea of an organic, mystical union of the two natures in one person, a union, which makes every act the act of the whole person, of the divine-human person as such, not in any case of one nature or the other by itself. The whole earthly life of Jesus was a divine-human life; nor at any time divine alone, nor at any time human alone; and so is his life in eternity; and his redeeming work is a divine-human work from beginning to end. There is no separating the two natures in the acting, any more than in the constitution of his person. He is ever one Christ. On Jesus' wondering at the unbelief of the Nazarenes (p. 146), Dr. A. well says; "To reconcile omniscience with surprise is no part of our privilege or duty. All such seeming contradictions are parts of the great mystery of godliness, God manifsst in the flesh, the union of humanity and deity in one theanthropic person. be However incomprehensible to our finite faculties may the coëxistence in one person of the divine logos and a human soul, the possession of the latter, if conceded, carries with it all the attributes and acts of which a perfect human soul is capable ;" and that, we may add, as attributes and acts, not of the human nature merely, but of the whole theanthropic person. But when the author proceeds: "While to Christ's divinity or eternal spirit there could be nothing new or strange, to his humanity surprise and wonder were familiar,"-he betrays an effort after a rational "comprehension" of the "mystery," false to the proper mental posture, which would express itself in the words just before quoted, and rest in them.

But we do not propose a lengthened discussion of this volume. It is not offered as a learned commentary, like the same author's large work on Isaiah. It evidently aims rather to meet the capacities of the general intelligent reader of the Scriptures. An under-current of thorough scholarship and fresh, independent thought of course runs through it, and it is plainly no mere by-work of the author. Indeed this makes our disappointment the greater, when we find some difficult subjects, such as demoniacal possession, passed over so easily, with an explanation indeed in terms very familiar, such as "personal," &c., yet terms, which in such connection call for further discriminating definition. But in general its exegetical analysis is very clear, pursued in a reverent and devout spirit, and leaving the hortatory element, or "practical applications," to be supplied by every reader for himself. Not the least of the merits of this work, as a popular commentary, is the direct and lively narrative style, maintained as a continuous thread throughout the book; preserving to a good extent in the commentary itself the original form and spirit of the Gospel as a connected and complete history. The work is not only a book of reference, but a decidedly readable volume. And we welcome it as a valuable contribution to the standard exegetical literature of our country.

S. N. A.

ART. IV.-THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE.

THE first and highest business and mission of every individual man is to glorify God by his own physical, mental, and moral elevation-to seek the perfection of his nature, by becoming all that he may become, for himself, for oth ers, and for God.

Whenever any one is found earnest, by endeavoring to attain to this, his course commends itself to all men, and is openly praised as noble by the good, and silently acknowledged as such even by those who have not the will and the courage to attempt it for themselves.

It is pleasant to see even a seed that is planted unfolding itself to the full extent of its native capacity in the symmetrical plant and the perfected fruit; on the other hand, it is pitiful and painful to behold it enfeebled in the germ, pining in its growth, and falling short of its fruit. There is something in us which instinctively says: "Well, and bravely done," when in anything-be it plant, insect, bird, beast, or man-we behold all its possibilities becoming actualities.

In man, the highest, this endeavor is the noblest, and its success the grandest. Would it not be strange were such an end reached without care and conflict. Even a grain of wheat, in unfolding. the possibilities that are in it, maintains the siege against the drought, the wet, the frost, the fly, the weevil, the rust, the hail-and only when it has kept the field against all these successive phalanxes of enemies lying in wait, and rushing upon it, does it present its golden ear to the joy of the reaper.

The hindrances to our development are yet more and greater. To overcome them is greater than to take a city. To know how to accomplish this is the highest knowledge; actually to attain it is the highest victory; to fall short of it is the most deplorable of failures.

What is the source or power by which individual man is, and may be elevated, so as to become what it is possible for him to be? We have been careful not to say, "How does he elevate himself?" because it is our design to show that his elevation requires a power beyond and around himself -that he needs a backing and support to his individual purposes and endeavors-a power underlying and surrounding his individual life-in the element and energy of which alone the possibilities that lie in his nature are called forth. and actualized. This power-whatever we may, in the course of our present investigation, find it to be-we figuratively call the power behind the throne-indicating thereby that a man in the highest earthly position, is not necessarily elevated in that which constitutes the perfection of his individual nature. A Herod on the throne was eaten by worms? He elevated himself, but he was not elevated. Greater than the King, which is an office, is the man, which is a being; and when this being is unfolded to all that it may be, it has attained to what a King can not attain as a King, but only as a man-by a power therefore behind the throne, and greater than it.

Human life, like all life, can only grow toward its full development, when it has its proper soil and surroundings. A seed may include in itself all the possibilities of growth, but they are latent till it is brought into connection with the proper outward conditions of growth-without these it remains forever a seed only. So the capability of excellence lies in every individual being; but it will never be developed unless it is nursed and incited by its proper outward conditions. A grain of wheat in the granary or in the dry sand has no power to put forth; so an individual being has no power to unfold his possibilities of bimself, except as backed and moved by powers around, behind, and beneath him. The latent power of will, the energies of mind, on the inmost throne of our being, are as helpless as lungs without air, or as heart without blood, if not themselves vitalized by a power that is not inherent in them. When once a man shall lift himself over the