from the writings of the fathers. Peter Comestor, also, in this century abridged the history of the Old and New Testament, and his work was extensively used for the instruction of the young. In the early part of the century it will be enough to mention, as a general writer of much merit, Bernard, abbot of Clairval, and Euthymius Zigabenus, a commentator on the Gospels. The name of Anselm, the most distinguished theologian of his day, brings us into the eleventh century; in which also we find Theophylact, whose commentary on most of the books of the New Testament, according to the fashion of the day, is collected mainly from Chrysostom, and some others of the fathers. The commentary of Lanfranc on St. Paul's Epistles, and of Berenger on the Revelations, also belong to this century; as well as the controversies in which they were engaged.

The school divinity dates its birth from the period which has last passed under review. The tenth century now opens upon us with even less that can command respect. The perverted rage for dialectics, which distinguished the systems of later writers, had succeeded to one still more barren and jejune. It might have been more satisfactory to have culled a few sweet herbs, or fragrant flowers, from the wild and thorny jungle we must pass through; but the truth forbids us to cast a veil over the roughness of the path. It is not however a desert; and the very plants that disfigure the neglected waste, prove at least that the rain of heaven descends, and there is some latent power of vege tation in the soil. These ages furnish us, if not with all we wish, yet with all we want; for the Scriptures still continue to be commented upon; and the fathers still continue to supply, not merely the chief, but at this time almost the sole fountain, whence those comments are derived. The favourite authors for illustration were now John of Damascus; Augustine, Gregory, and, with some, Bede and Rabanus Maurus; the writers of the age were Simeon Metaphrastes, the fanciful compiler, or rather interpolater of the Lives of the Saints, among the Greeks; Moysis Barcephas among the Eastern Christians; Ratherius of Verona, among the Latins, and a host of commentators, of whom Olympiodorus and Ecumenius are in most esteem. There has been indeed some doubt about the age of the two last mentioned; but the latter seems to be fixed with to

lerable certainty to the concluding half of this century. His work is a catena on the Acts and Epistles; and the practice of the age, in coupling the fathers with the Scriptures, is further illustrated by an anecdote of Nilus, a Calabrian monk, who outlived the century by only five years. His anonymous biographer was a disciple, and probably present at an interview he records between the saint and some priests of Calabria. The disputants are therein made to appeal to the writings of the fathers, as well as those of the Evangelists and St. Paul, as authoritative on the question under debate: Suidas the Lexicographer, whose valuable labours have embraced the extant literature of his day, both sacred and profane, is placed with great probability in this century; and the commentaries of Remigius belong partly to this and partly to the ninth, in which a transitory gleam lights us on our way. The celebrated Photius, patriarch of Constantinople, is known to have received the books of the New Testament as we receive them. His commentaries on St. Paul, of whom he was an enthusiastic admirer, are said to have supplied Ecumenius with much of the materials for his catena; and he has left a book of Questions, in number three hundred and eight, mostly relating to various passages of the Old and New Testament. The persecution of Gotteschalcus, and the Glossa marginalis of Walafrid Strabo, conduct us to Rabanus Maurus, the opponent of the first, and tutor of the second; whose gloss was a catena on the whole Bible, derived from the Latin fathers, and disposed along the margin of each page. The literary court of Charlemagne connects this century with the eighth; but I shall mention only the Emperor himself, and his preceptor Alcuin; and pass on to John of Damascus, whose system of theology, entitled Four Books of the Orthodox Faith, the first regular system known, was to the Greeks what the works of Lombard and Aquinas were among the Latins; and combined the scholastic and didactic methods; though in his other works he confines himself chiefly to the fathers. The Commentaries and other works of the venerable Bede belong to the opening of this century, and are for the most part didactic, though interspersed with much that is original.

The few bright beams that burst forth from the thick darkness of ignorance in the eighth century, and struggled

on through the ninth, had cast but a feeble portion of their light on the seventh, which had for the most part passed away, as it had begun, in gloom. Of the fathers we find Gregory and Augustine still the favourites; and Paterius compiled an expositon of the Bible entirely from the writings of the first of these. Maximus, a monk of Chrysopolis, about the middle of the century, was engaged on questions, like those of Photius, on the Scriptures, and succeeded Sophronius, Bishop of Jerusalem, as the champion of the orthodox faith against the Monophysites, who were condemned at the sixth general council at Constantinople; and Antiochus, a monk of Palestine, composed a brief summary of Christian doctrine, which, after the noble work of Justinian, he called "The Pandect of the Holy Scriptures:" while in the east, Thomas of Heraclea revised and corrected the Philoxenian Version, by the aid of three Greek Manuscripts, carefully collated for the purpose.

Leontius and Isodore of Seville introduce us to the authors of the sixth century; each has left us one or more catalogues, agreeing precisely with the books now received; and their eminent contemporary, Gregory the Great, frequently quotes from all. Gregory first gave the sanction of the popedom to Jerome's translation of the Bible; and here first we fall in with Origenism. Earlier in the century come Evagrius, Cassiodorius, a Senator of Rome, and Cosmas Indicopleustes, whose visit to the Christians on the coast of Malabar makes his name one of peculiar interest to the native of this eastern land. The Philoxenian Syriac Version was also completed in the year 508. The course of time has now once more landed us among those who could depend upon their own resources; we have in fact already entered the very company of venerable fathers, from whom the absence of inherent light had compelled the feeble luminaries of later ages to borrow the little splendour they can boast: I shall, therefore, add but one more name here, Procopius of Gaza, the secretary to the famous Belisarius; who, with no dearth of original powers, was the first to devise a catena, a mode of exposition, we have seen, eagerly caught at by many of his own age, and the following.

The concluding years of the fifth century shall not detain us long. Gennadius has left a history of Illustrious Men; and a Treatise on the Revelation of St. John. Eutha

lius, bishop of Sulca in Egypt, published elaborate editions of the Acts of the Apostles, St. Paul's Epistles; and the seven catholic Epistles, in which he carefully collected all the citations made from the Old Testament, or other writers, marking the places where they were to be found. Salvian, a presbyter of Marseilles, falls about the middle of the century; and his contemporary, Leo the Great, of Rome, bring us to the date of the fourth and third general councils; and to the ecclesiastical historians Theodoret, Sozomen, and Socrates. The famous Latin writer Vincentius of Lerens flourished somewhat earlier; and the first thirty years of the century saw the far famed Augustine presiding, nominally over a small African see, but influentially directing the principles of a large portion of the universal church; and the wide spread reputation he then enjoyed has scarcely faltered since; it has perhaps never been exceeded by that of any uninspired author; nor, we may add, has any other ever so well merited the deference paid to their opinions.

Augustine, Chrysostom, Jerome, and Epiphanius take us into the fourth century; Ambrose, Gregory Nazianzen, Basil of Cæsarea, Ephrem the Syrian, Hilary of Poictiers, and the renowned and faithful Athanasius swell the list of writers in this century. All these were men of eminence, and some of surpassing eminence, in the age in which they lived, and in the large remains of their valuable works have left full and important testimony to the Scriptures they believed and illustrated. Nor was it their office or their talents alone that gave them notoriety; they lived in troublous times; and the stirring questions which then convulsed the Christian Church, called forth all their energies; and at the same time rendered their labours necessary, determined the end to which they should be directed; and dispersed them through every quarter of the then known world. It will take too much space to detail the catalogues and other testimonies so plentifully scattered over every page of these illustrious, and often voluminous authors. Nor can I do more than barely allude to the two general councils of Nice and Constantinople that assembled during this period. To Eusebius, however, I shall devote some considerable space; and the extracts I have to make from him will give an opportunity of appending some general remarks that will, more or less, apply to all.

My first extract will be from the twenty-fifth chapter of the third book of his Ecclesiastical History, the title of which is, "Of the Scriptures universally acknowledged, and those that are not such." "It will be proper," he says, "to enumerate here, in a summary way, the books of the New Testament which have been already mentioned. And in the first place are to be ranked the sacred four Gospels: then the book of the Acts of the Apostles; after that are to be reckoned the Epistles of Paul. In the next place that called the first Epistle of John, and the Epistle of Peter are to be esteemed authentic. After these is to be placed, if it be thought fit, the Revelation of John, about which we shall observe the different opinions at a proper season. Of the controverted, but yet well known, or approved by the most, are that called the Epistle of James, and that of Jude, and the second of Peter, and the second and third of John; whether they are written by the Evangelist, or another of the same name. Among the spurious are to be placed the Acts of Paul, and the book entitled the Shepherd; and the Revelation of Peter; and beside these that called the Epistle of Barnabas, and the book named the Doctrines of the Apostles. And moreover, as I said, the Revelation of John, if it seem meet; which some, as I have said, reject; others reckon among the books universally received." A little lower down the author gives his reason for adding the names of the spurious books;-to distinguish the true, genuine, and universally acknowledged Scriptures from the controverted, and those published by heretics, which "are not so much as to be reckoned among the spurious, but are to be rejected as altogether absurd and impious." The language of this passage is deficient in exactness; and the writer has certainly failed to express his meaning very clearly. He appears to have intended to distinguish four different classes of books: those univerally acknowledged; those received by most, but concerning which some were in doubt; those received only by a few; and lastly those uniformly rejected by all the orthodox, such as the Gospels of Peter, and Thomas, and Matthias, and the Acts of Andrew and John, which he specifies as instances of these "forgeries of heretics."

Putting together, then, all that can be collected from this important chapter of Eusebius, and from other extant