ἐγέννησε τὸν Ἰακώβ. This use of the article is found in the genealogy in the Septuagint, to wit, the fifth of Genesis. There are also phrases, idiomatic usages, which are readily recognized in all languages, but which do not come under any general law. It is sufficient if there can be found a general significance to its presence or absence which may always be recognized by the careful student.

We have considered thus far the writings of Paul, who was skilled in classical Greek, as shown by his quotations, and whose style would be formed on Greek rather than on the Hebrew models. The Gospel of John may show us how carefully the article was employed by a Palestinian Jew whose theology is based upon the Old Testament, who seems to have known Hebrew, whose language though Greek is strongly tinged with a Hebrew vocabulary and Hebrew modes of expression. (See Plummer on St. John. Introduction, p. 28.)

The commentator just mentioned calls attention to the significance of the article as used by John, who would not be supposed to be as accurate in this regard as those more conversant with classical Greek. John v, 35, has been literally translated by the revisers with added force: "He was the lamp that burneth and shineth," a great improvement over our authorized: "He was a burning and a shining light." John was the lamp, not the light. He was not merely a lamp, but the lamp, the well known herald of the Messiah, whose lamp was kindled at the true light, which was Christ. How much the rendering of the article adds to the force of the thought!

In John vii, 51, notice the force of the article with vóuos in calling attention to the special Jewish law with which they were familiar: "Doth our law (ó vóuoc) judge a man, except it first. hear from himself and know what he doeth?" The translation of the article by the possessive pronoun gives a good rendering of the force of the article and is material to the argument. Again, John xii, 36: "While ye have the light, believe on the light, that ye may become sons of light." The absence of the article with "light" and "sons" in the last clause is noteworthy. It teaches the close relationship between the light and him who believes on it. It shows the qualitative aspect of the predicate. A similar force is given by the absence of the article in John xvi, 21, when "She remembereth no more the anguish, for the

joy that a man is born into the world." A man (åv¤¤ʊπoç), such a being as a man, a human being, is born into the world. It is the characteristic of that which is born which is thereby indicated rather than the birth of the individual child.

There is another realm of New Testament expression which shows the importance of the proper understanding of the force of the article, namely, those which bear upon the names given to our Saviour, especially in his relationship to God. As an example of the presence and absence of the article in close connection take Eph. i, 3: Εὐλογητὸς ὁ Θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, etc. Revisers' translation: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." Ellicott translates: "God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." It is unnecessary to discuss the law of the grammarians on the repetition of the article with nouns joined by the conjunction kaí, as the object is to show the value of the absence and presence of the article. It is a rule of classic Greek that Ocóc with the article means the particular God, but without it divinity in general. Here Paul recognizes by the article with Oɛóc the personal God. But is the next word the same or a different person, and why is the article wanting with the word Father, if it refers to the same person? Has not the noun Taτo a predicative force, and makes thereby a strong affirmation concerning God, namely, that the relation to our Lord Jesus Christ is that of Father? The relationship of God to Christ is that of father and son, not that of master and servant.

Such a rendering is applied by T. S. Green (Grammar, p. 48) to John i, 14: δόξαν ὡς μονογενοῦς παρὰ πατρός.

In this place povoyevous is virtually a substantive; and it is also clear that the language might have been τοῦ μονογενούς παρὰ τοῦ Tаτρоç. Now, there can here be hardly any plea of license, and therefore the absence of the article is designed, and the object is to give the most effective expression of the characteristic circumstances of the mission of Jesus, standing in unapproachable contrast to that of all other divine messengers, such, in fact, as is best expressed in the words of the parable, ἔτι ἕνα εἶχεν, υἱὸν ȧуапητóν. . . . (Mark xii, 6), “And we beheld his glory, glory as of an only-begotten one come forth from a father, and, as such, contrasted with a mere servant, like Moses or the prophets."

If a further example of this mode of interpreting the absence of the article is needed, it will be found in John vii, 45: "The

officers therefore came to the chief priests and Pharisees." Pharisees being without the article shows that the latter involves some explanation of the former, or involves some predication concerning the chief priests. Plummer (comment on passage) says: "The omission of roús before Papioaíovę shows that the chief priests and Pharisees are now regarded as one body."

At this point we may pause, the object of this paper being to set forth an exposition of the Greek Article in the New Testament, not novel, but which has not yet taken its place among the accepted theories on that subject. The recognized view is represented by Winer in his incomparable "Grammar of the Idiom of the New Testament Greek." It is also proper to add, that the majority of interpreters have not explained the force of the omission of the article, especially with vouoc, as here advocated. That so many eminent biblical scholars have employed the more literal mode of rendering it, and that our late revisers have not entirely discarded it, but have shown how often the exact translation gives clearness and force to the argument, may be employed to prove at least that the tendency of modern scholarship is in the direction here indicated. Whatever may be the conclusions reached, the careful investigation of the minutest forms of expression in the Holy Scriptures must be a matter of permanent interest to all lovers of the truth as it is in Jesus, the Saviour.

It has thus been attempted to place before the reader some observations on important passages of Scripture growing out of the laws governing the Greek article. As shown in the beginning, it is a matter which is regarded by some of the best grammarians as beyond the reach of our investigations, and that we must therefore be content with a few general principles. If we must come to that conclusion let it only be after constant application to the study of the word of God. It will be found generally that the nearer we come to literalness in our interpretations, the more we aim to be governed by what the word says, and not by what we think it ought to say, the more consistent will be our interpretations with each other, and the more surely, with the divine guidance, may we attain the "mind of the Spirit."

15-FIFTH SERIES, VOL. I.

ART. IV.-REV. SYDNEY SMITH.

EDWARD EVERETT, writing of his "delightful visit" at CombeFlorey, the rectory of Rev. Sydney Smith, said: "The first remark I made to myself after listening to Mr. Sydney Smith's conversation was, that if he had not been known as the wittiest man of his day he would have been accounted one of the wisest." This epigrammatic observation is equivalent to saying that Mr. Smith's wit was so brilliant that it eclipsed his sagacity. Ilis wise thoughts, of which his speech was by no means barren, were like small jewels incased in settings so large and so curiously wrought as to divert the observer's attention from the gems they were meant to display. Hence it came to pass that, as one of his admirers has recently remarked, his memory is kept green, not so much by his really "great services to rational freedom" as by his humorous sayings, many of which have become current coin in the speech of the reading world.

Perhaps there is a modicum of poetic justice in this. Mr. Smith resembled Democritus, the laughing philosopher of antiquity, of whom Juvenal said, that he laughed at the world whenever he stepped across his threshold. Smith did more, for his jocund laughter at men and things constantly rang out both within and without his threshold. And this sportive laughter was every-where contagious. All men enjoyed it and joined in it. But could they, on reflection, help suspecting that the weed of contempt grew close by the sources of those streams of amusing specch which flowed so constantly from his lips? That shrewd observer, Montaigne, remarks, that "things we laugh at are by that laughter expressed to be of no moment." How natural it was, therefore, that the wisdom of our modern Democritus being so lightly expressed, so apparently lacking in earnestness not to say sincerity, should float unheeded from the memories of men, and that he should be remembered more as a "remarkable buffoon" than as a reformer of many social abuses. Mr. Stuart J. Reid's new biography, which aims to

"A Sketch of the Life and Times of the Rev. Sydney Smith, Rector of CombeFlorey, and Canon Residentiary of St. Paul's. Based on Family Documents and the Recollection of Personal Friends." By Stuart J. Reid. Illustrated. 8vo, pp. 20, 409. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1884.

bring the best side of Sydney Smith's character into bolder relief, may be accepted as evidence that the interest of the public in his career is still sufficiently strong to justify the publication of a fresh contribution to his memory. It may therefore be presumed that a brief outline of his history and a glance at his life-work may not be unacceptable to the readers. of this Review.

The parents of Sydney Smith were neither rich nor titled. In allusion to his somewhat plebeian origin, he used to say in his jocose way "The Smiths never had any arms,' and have invariably sealed their letters with their thumbs." His father, Mr. Robert Smith, inherited a small property which he was not sufficiently a man of affairs to increase. A vein of eccentricity ran through his character. He was odd and gloried in his oddity. He was nevertheless possessed of some rare intellectual qualities. He was fortunate in his marriage to a lady of French descent and Huguenot blood, who was endowed with both beauty of form and nobility of mind. From her Sydney Smith inherited his remarkable vivacity, geniality, and energy; and his father's oddity was reproduced, though considerably chastened, in those queerly expressed exaggerations which characterized his wit.

Sydney Smith's early life was not on the whole very enjoyable. He was born in 1771 at Woodford, Essex, the second of four brothers and one sister. In their childhood these precocious brothers preferred books and bookish discussions to the sports of the play-ground. When only six years old, Sydney was sent from home, first to a private school and then, with his younger brother Courtenay, to the Winchester Grammar School. In this latter institution he suffered extremely, as John Wesley did at the Charter-House, through lack of sufficient food and the rough semi-brutal conduct of his senior school-mates. To the day of his death the recollection of this abusive treatment roused him to sharp resentment. His progress in learning, however, was so rapid that he became captain of the school. He and his brother were so successful in winning prizes that the boys of their form wrote to the head master, saying, "We will not try for the college prizes if the Smiths are allowed to contend for them any more, because they always get them."