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to communicate with him." It is true that Good Friday is "a day of humiliation;" but it is likewise a day of religious exultation. To use the words of good Bishop Andrewes, in his celebrated Sermon on the Passion, II., preached on Good Friday, "This day is-In respect of that He suffered, (I deny not,) an evill day; a day of heavinesse: But, in respect of that, which He, by it, hath obtained for us, It is (as we may truly call it) A good Day; a day of joy and Iubilee." (p. 361.) And that this excellent prelate (who, if he may not in strictness be called contemporary with the Reformers of our church, may at least be supposed to have known their mind and their practice) approved of the administration of the sacrament on this day will be evident from the following extract from his first Sermon on the Passion, "preached at the Court on the 25th March, A.D. 1597, being Good Friday." "Of the later (the bloud) which the Prophet (in the ix. chapter before) calleth the bloud of the New Testament, we may receive this day; for it will run in the high and holy mysteries of the body and bloud of CHRIST."-Bishop Andrewes's Sermons, p. 345. I am, Sir, yours &c., T. E.

ON EPHESIANS iv. 17-24.

SIR,-Permit me to offer the following observations on Ephesians iv. 17-24, to your notice.

In vv. 17-19 the apostle, in describing the former "conversation," reminds the Ephesian converts of what they formerly were as "Gentiles in the flesh," when they "walked in the vanity of their mind;" and in vv. 20-24 he contrasts this their former course of life with their "learning of Christ," "now that they are in Christ Jesus," and have "heard him and been taught in him as the truth is in Jesus." If to walk in the vanity of their mind is opposed to the learning of Christ, it follows that vanity of mind is the error which is opposed to Christ, who is the truth; and that the lusts of this error, and the righteousness and holiness of this truth, are very inadequately and ambiguously translated as deceitful lusts and true holiness, in the received version.

St. Paul tells the Ephesians that they have "learned Christ, if so be they have heard him and been taught in him as the truth is in Jesus;" and immediately goes on to explain what this learning of Christ, both morally and practically, is in the three following verses. To learn Christ is, morally, to be "renewed in the spirit of their mind;" and, practically, to "put on the new man, which, according to God, has been created in the righteousness and holiness of the truth,' on the one hand; and, on the other, it is both morally and practically to put off the old man, which, according to the former conversation, is corrupt according to the lusts of the error,"-i. e., according to the lusts of the vanity of their mind in which they had formerly walked when they were "darkened in understanding on account of the hardness of their heart," and " alienated from the life of God on account.

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of the ignorance which was in them ;" and when also, in consequence of this moral insensibility to, and ignorance of sin, they had "delivered themselves over to lasciviousness," of which the practical product is "the working of all uncleanness with greediness." But renewal in the spirit of the mind, and vanity of the same mind are respectively the moral consequences of hearing and being taught in Christ, as the truth is in Jesus, and of darkness of the understanding on account of hardness of heart, and of alienation from the life of God on account of ignorance; and also the putting on of the new man, which, according to God's purpose of mercy in Christ, has been created in the righteousness and holiness of the same truth, and the surrendering of ourselves to the lasciviousness which manifests itself in the working of all uncleanness with greediness, are respectively these moral consequences reduced to practice. Hence the lusts of THE error, or of the vanity of the mind, are both, in cause and effect, contrasted with the righteousness and holiness of THE truth, as it is in Jesus; and this literal translation points out and defines the true meaning which deceitful lusts and true holiness involves in obscurity and doubtfulness.

It may also be observed, that the office and person of our Lord are brought into opposition in ver. 20. To "learn Christ" comes to us from "hearing and being taught in him as the truth is in Jesus;" and a careful study of the epistle has served to convince me, that the apostle invariably preserves the distinction between the relation which Jesus Christ bears to his father as his son, and that which Christ Jesus bears to us as our Lord, and him in whom the Father has "made us accepted in his grace." The Father hath "predestined us into the adoption of sons by Jesus Christ," and hath "quickened us, &c., in Christ Jesus." A further investigation of this subject would, at present, trespass too much upon your time and space.

I am, Sir, yours very faithfully, M. V.

PROMETHEUS VINCTUS.

SIR, I have just seen an article that appeared in the British Magazine for March last, headed "Prometheus Vinctus," and in which, as I am not a little interested, I look to your sense of justice for affording me the opportunity of replying to an attack as unfounded as it was uncalled for.

A person, whose real want of belief is betrayed by his over-acting the character of a Puritan, has, under the signature of T. E., thought fit, in a publication avowedly unconnected with the review of classical books, to denounce an edition of the Prometheus, designed for the use of Schools and Colleges, as a work of immoral and irreligious tendency.

A charge of so grave a nature ought to be supported by something

*Not an article, but a letter.-ED.

better than insinuations; and though T. E. may, for reasons best known to himself, and of which I can more than guess the cause, endeavour to prevent the sale of a work, by artfully appealing to the prejudices of the public, I feel confident that in no single instance has he been able, whatever he might wish, to convict me of either stating a falsehood or misrepresenting a fact; and till he does that, I shall continue to believe that the plain statement of a naked fact can never produce, as T. E. seems to anticipate, "the loss of an immortal soul;" and that a volume, in which nothing is told but what divines themselves have told more fully, is very "fit to be admitted into any seminary of sound learning and religious education;" and when T. E. confesses himself, that all "he can point out is a tone of levity and flippancy in some of the remarks which render the intentions of the writer, to use the mildest term, very equivocal."

Now, Sir, let me ask with what justice can T. E. attribute bad motives to me when he confesses that I have followed such men as Grotius, Dickinson, Gale, Bryant, Ireland, and, I may add, Faber, in shewing the connexion between pagan mythology and scriptural truth. But, says T. E., the inclination to trace such a connexion has been carried too far. Surely, Sir, this is a strange admission for a sincere believer, if T. E. be one, to make; as if revealed truth could be injured by shewing that the nations who sat in darkness had still, by the aid of natural religion, a faint idea of those mysteries which it was the especial purpose of our Saviour's coming to make as clear as the sun at noon-day.

Of the notes complained of, the first relates to the fact, that, as Christ was a Priest after the order of Melchisedec, it was of importance to shew that this similarity probably alluded to the circumstance that both were anaтóρeç; a remark, I conceive, more likely to gain the praise than censure of a writer like T. E., nor could a sincere believer be offended at hearing that some of those who deny the divinity of Christ are compelled to have a recourse to a solution of the miracle that carries blasphemy on the face of it.

The second note is objected to because I have stated that the doctrine of a future life was promulgated in the time of schylus. But, Sir, you at least, as a scholar, need not be told that such a doctrine was received by many long before the appearance of our Saviour, and formed, as we learn from Cicero, one of the tenets taught to the initiated in the mysteries.

The third note is found fault with because I have compared two passages in the Iliad with two in Sacred Writ. But, as Bishop Blomfield has noted such parallelisms without a word of censure, even from T. E., I am yet to learn why my notes are to be decried as irreligious, while the similar notes of others are overlooked.

The fourth note so offensive to T. E. is worth transcribing, as a specimen of what length a man will go who is determined to find fault with or without reason:—

"Places struck by lightning were considered holy, and consecrated by the sacrifice of a young ram. Such, probably, was the spot chosen by Abraham for the sacrifice

of Isaac.'

Now, Sir, may I request you to tell me, in a foot note, what any reasonable person can have to complain of either in the fact here told or in the manner of telling it?

The fifth note is objected to because the supposed prophetic power of Prometheus is compared with the real prophetic power of our Lord; I say supposed, because T. E. seems to have forgotten that the power attributed to Prometheus is a fiction of the poet, while the power exercised by Christ is a matter of fact.

The sixth note merely explains the origin of the custom of a king touching for the cure of the evil, and of a bishop putting his hand on the head of the child during the act of confirmation. But what is there in all this to offend the most strict believer ?-and why is a note so harmless to be denounced as flippant, immoral, and irreligious? The seventh note is the following:

66

"'EXEλe. This, like the Allelu-jah, is generally the shout of joy; here, of pain.

Now, Sir, why is a book that contains such a note unfit to be put into the hands of boys?

The seventh note selected for special animadversion is the following:

"For thus the three rulers of things above, round, and under the earth, (that is, Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto,) the Trinity in unity of the Pagan creed, are threatened with destruction at the appearance of a future redeemer, that is, of Hercules; of whom it was said, if my conjecture be correct, that ̓́Αλλους, ὀλόμενος αὐτὸς, ἐκσῶσαι

θέλων.”

The last offensive remark, touching the contested point whether Christ did or did not go down into hell, and which the late Dr. Parr was in the habit of settling by substituting Hades for Hell, was, as I have stated in my note, first alluded to by Dr. Butler; and therefore, if there be any flippancy or irreligious tendency in such annotations, the fault does not rest with me, but with learned divines who have preceded me as editors of Æschylus.

I will conclude this letter with a short, but pithy, fable of Æsop, to prove, as in my own case, that one man may steal a sheep while another is hanged for looking over the hedge:

Ποιμένας ἰδών ποτ' ἐσθίοντας ἐν σκήνῃ

Πρόβατον λύκος προσῆλθεν ἐγγὺς, ὥστ ̓ εἰπεῖν,

Εἰ τοῦτ ̓ ἐποίουν, ἐγένετ ̓ ἂν πόση κραυγή;

I am, Sir,

The Editor of Valpy's Prometheus, with English Notes,

GEORGE BURGES.

P.S. Since writing the above, I am given to understand that Mr. Valpy has cancelled all the notes objected to, because he was unwilling that any of his editions should be thought, even remotely, to touch upon subjects likely to interfere with religion, or to wound the feelings of schoolmasters in any way whatever.

ESSAYS ON THE CHURCH.

SIR,-You have fallen into two or three errors, when speaking, in your last number, of my little work, which I think fairly entitle me to a corner in your next publication for the purpose of explanation.

1. You tell your readers of me, that "he says, that Mr. A. Baring stated in Parliament that the see of London is worth 100,000l. per annum," &c.; and you ask "how does he excuse himself for thus circulating a gross falsehood?"

My reply is the shortest and simplest possible,-I never said so. The passage to which you allude is this: "It was stated, a short time since, by Mr. Baring, in the House of Commons, we know not with what correctness, that within a few years, the see of London would become, by the termination of certain leases, worth nearly 100,0007. per annum.'

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Surely every one can see, at a glance, the vast difference of the statement which you attribute to me, and that which I actually made. In censuring the passage as it really stands, I think you should shew, either that the statement attributed to Mr. Baring was never made by him, or that that gentleman is of too careless or inimical a character to warrant me in quoting from him, or that the fact had been shewn to be otherwise. As you have not done either, I must continue to think that

*

It is matter of great regret that so very objectionable a chapter as that on Church Reform should have beeen inserted in so useful and excellent a work as that alluded to, and it is still more to be regretted that the author should thus persist in his views.

It is unnecessary to reply to the singular reasonings in his letter. A very few words will suffice as to the facts.

(1.) The review distinctly states that the author says he does not know whether Mr. Baring's statement is correct! This is remarkable; what follows is rather more curious. The letter says that the review ought" to shew that the fact had been shewn to be otherwise." This is the very thing which the review does. It states that in the reports of the debates in Parliament, whence alone the author could have got authentic information as to Mr. Baring's assertion, he would have found an authentic contradiction of it. The Bishop of London himself, in the Lords, stated the amount of his income distinctly. The author's not knowing or not alluding to this contradiction is one of the very things of which the review complains. Did the author overlook all this, and then write his letter of complaint? If so, this is really a strange waste of good time; and the reviewer would be sorry to accuse the author of wilful suppre.sion of the words used.

(2.) As to any application of the phrase "timid and listless guardians of the church" to the clergy of Pancras and Marylebone, the letter writer must surely have been doing something else when he read the review. There is nothing like it. The fact is, that the reviewer understood him (rightly or wrongly) to use the phrase of the Bishops, and not of " the inferior clergy;" and as to Pancras and Marylebone, they are not joined in the Review, but St. James's and Marylebone. One cannot reply farther to a charge made so much in the dark.

(3.) The last observation is more applicable here. The ignorance imputed was an ignorance of the condition of the Crown livings, those belonging to the Chancellor being in general so notoriously small, and as notoriously constituting the overwhelming majority of the livings belonging to the crown, two facts which make such a measure as the author recommends impossible.

Finally, the statement that the see of London is, or will shortly be, 100,000l. a year, when it has been publicly stated to be under 14,000l., and the founding much reasoning on that addition would alone be a sufficient objection to the circulation of the work till so serious a falsehood (not a wilful indeed, but not on that account a less

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