kingdom for the education of our higher class of youths. He has given us the opportunity now of judging of his system more fully. It is quite right a locus penitentiae should be granted him. No Christian man will hastily condemn another. Had we found certain received doctrines of the church positively and distinctly enunciated, his vindication, though not complete, would have been so far satisfactory. But the character of these Sermons is negative rather than positive. There is lacking in them those unequivocal forms of expression of Christian doctrine which none could mistake; and when we know that such expressions as "atonement," "justification by faith," "sacrifice,' "the cross," ," "righteousness," have all a new meaning attached to them by the new school, we may justly feel mistrust where the sense in which these are used is not defined. Dr. Temple may think it hard to be thus judged; but we are bound to judge him as much by what he does not say as by what he does say, when he comes before us professedly as a teacher of Scripture truth; just as a physician would judge of the state of his patient, not merely by what he might state respecting himself, but by those symptoms which the physician's own diagnosis had told him were the signs and proofs of the existence of a certain form of disease. Dr. Temple has not yet cleared himself from the suspicions that had attached to him. Would that we could see him restored to the confidence of the church! He may have been unfortunate in his associations; and if, as we are ready to believe, he has been led unwittingly into a false position, it behoves him to give some explicit proof of this, and to disconnect himself wholly from opinions with which his name has become ingloriously identified. To kick a fallen man, would be cowardly in the extreme; to help him to recover himself, is the part of a Christian. "If a brother be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted." (Gal. v. 1.) It is for Dr. Temple to say whether his fault was one which overtook him, or one which he knowingly embraced with a determination to defy the general opinion. Charity hopes the former; truth, as yet, demands belief of the latter. He has come into court for judgment, and we honestly give our decision.

As regards the style in which Dr. Temple's Sermons are written, there is much to admire. It is not the language we find fault with, but the doctrine. The style may be truly described by the well-known expression, simplex munditiis. There is a chaste simplicity, a classical neatness in the dress in which the thoughts are clothed. In this respect they remind us of the sermons of the late archdeacon Manning, the style of which served to make a germinating Romanism so attractive to many minds till its fungus offended them. There is a fresh

ness and a greenness in the forms of expression, which is like the fresh and tender green of the young leaves of spring. This is very pleasing. There is also in them much that is true, and just, and beautiful in thought. But we must not allow this to cause us to overlook, or to speak lightly of, the latent Rationalism that runs through them. Like a vein of mineral in the earth, this, though it disappears now and then for a space, is clearly traceable. And this is what vitiates them. They are moulded and formed after a new type of thought. Their doctrine is neither that of the old "high and dry" School, nor of the later and more vital Evangelical. It is a new School, called, by way of distinction, Neologian, which is trying to force itself up, and to overlay our received theology with its own obscurities, in the form of novel interpretations. It would substitute a misty Rationalism in the place of the pure dry light of Heaven. It is a coin from the mint of intellectual conceit. And the danger is, that the distinguished names of its authors will help to give it currency; as men in general are more influenced by names than by things, by persons than by principles, in adopting any set of opinions. Many will be too ready to say, "If such learned men as Dr. Temple and Professor Jowett are wrong, who then can be right?"

It may be laid down as a general rule-though it is a rule the world will always be slow to give heed to that men of great talent are, in matters of religion, the least to be trusted. Elated with intellectual pride, and carried away by the cometic power of their own minds, they are apt to rush daringly into the regions of speculation; to hazard opinions, the foundations of which they have never stooped to examine, or the consequences of which they will not see; and thus they startle and surprise the world with new and paradoxical doctrines, and dazzle men only to mislead. They want to appear original, and so, to appear original, they become erroneous. It is a remarkable fact, that almost all departures from the Faith have originated with the reputedly learned; that almost all assaults upon the stronghold of God's word have been made by the intellectually mighty; that almost every error which has gained currency among mankind has been gilded at its issue with the fine gold of natural genius. It was unlettered fishermen who first taught the Truth-it is philosophers who corrupt it. Hence the necessity to all of acting upon the caution given by the great Apostle: "Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ." (Col. ii. 8.)

We are sincerely sorry to have to repeat such a warning to Dr. Temple. May he yet be led to reconsider the whole question of Scripture doctrine, and to profit by the warnings he

receives.

A truly wise man will be willing to learn even from his intel

lectual inferiors. But what it behoves all Rationalists most to remember is, that reason, as it exists in men, is only our intellectual eye, and that, like the eye, to see it needs light, and that it can never see clearly or far without the light of heaven. "Wisdom," as the simple-minded Wordsworth has well said, “is ofttimes nearer when we stoop than when we soar."

THE FUTURE DESTINY OF THE JEWS.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

Ir cannot have escaped observation, that the question concerning the future destiny of the Jews is becoming more and more a public and practical question. I need only refer to the fact of the venerable Dr. Marsh proposing it as the theme of prayer for the Christian world this year; and also that our excellent brother, Dr. Cumming, is pointing out to us, in eloquent harangues, that it is at once our interest, our duty, and our mission as a nation, to forward, physically and materially, the return of the Jews to Palestine, as the first and foremost of the great events that are coming upon the earth. The matter thus assumes a startling significance; and one can scarcely conceive of a subject on which it is more desirable to have settled views. Unfortunately, however, my own mind-and I believe I speak for many others is far from being settled on this matter. We sincerely envy the delightful facility of apprehension and freedom from difficulties which some of our brethren seem to enjoy. It is not so with us. Whether the prejudices of education in another school cling too pertinaciously to us, or (as we are sometimes informed) we have not yet received that special illumination which this subject requires, I but certain it is that some of us are constantly praying for light, and studying the sacred word with all the impartiality we can command, and yet no further light comes, and we feel more than ever perplexed and distressed.

know not;

Inasmuch, then, as the Lord's people speak often one to another, and the Lord hearkens; and since one of the laws of the church is that "in the multitude of counsellors there is safety;" it has occurred to me that an appeal to one's brethren through your pages might be the means of drawing out some dispassionate, and condensed and satisfactory explanations.

If I may venture to suggest a thought or two as to my position, I would say that the point wherein my difficulties seem to centre, is the literal return and national restoration of the Jews in Palestine. Of the final and full conversion to Christ of this wonderful people, and its blessed sequences, as indicated in the 11th chapter of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, I have no

doubt. But I do not see the same, or indeed any sufficient warrant in God's word, for our belief in their restoration to their ancient land and peculiar privileges as a people. I do not deny that this thing may be, and that there is some probability of it, and that it would have a very powerful effect upon the nations of the earth; but I want to see the matter, which some affirm to be as distinct as the doctrine of the atonement, more clearly, ere I can accept it and act upon it as a yet unfulfilled part of the covenant promises of Jehovah.

The "literal return," then, is the point to be kept in view. It may be convenient to subdivide it into four heads, which will be found to cover the whole of the question. 1. There are the extra-Scriptural arguments; 2. there are those arising from the Abrahamic covenant; 3. from the Prophets; 4. from the New Testament references. The difficulties that seem to me to arise under these several heads are the following:

1. The extra-Scriptural arguments. It is frequently said, "Look at the Jew, what else is he reserved for amongst the nations of the earth?" It strikes me that this argument, from the present existence of the Jew, if valid for the return of Judah, must be taken as equally valid against the return of the "lost" tribes. Again, it is sometimes argued that the Jewish people are the most down-trodden on the face of the earth; indeed it is necessary to make them out to be such, in order that the language of the Prophets should apply to them. But here, I cannot fail to perceive an inconsistency; an inconsistency with facts. Is it so? Are not the Jews high, very high in the scale of social and moral condition, above most of the Gentile nations the North American Indians, the Fee-jee islanders, and the natives of Central Africa, for example. There appears also an inconsistency in the views entertained on this matter by our friends on the other side themselves. Are not the Jews sometimes held up on our platforms as possessing half the wealth of the world, and being equally intelligent, learned, and influential? How can these statements be said to harmonize?

Once more I find another difficulty here. Of this so-called down-trodden race, upon whom a judicial blindness is supposed to rest, and who must wait till another dispensation open to them the spiritual advantages which the Gentiles are now enjoying, it is found that during the last forty or fifty years actually a larger proportion have been converted and saved, than of Gentiles during the same period.

2. We come next to the bearing of the Abrahamic covenant upon this question. I need not say how frequently this covenant is referred to as yet standing over and waiting its accomplishment. I have heard an excellent and popular clergyman at a Jews' meeting base his remarks on Genesis xv.; "That land," he contended, "thus promised to

Abraham in covenant, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates, had not been granted yet, and therefore the Jews are still reserved to the full inheriting of that promise." More than this, I have understood that the Principal of one of our missionary colleges positively teaches that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob must be raised up from the dead, in order that God's promise of "this land" should be verified to them personally and individually.

Now, I must say, I have never listened to statements of this kind without feeling puzzled and pained.. "What a handle," I have said to myself, "does this offer to the infidel! For what promise or prediction in God's word can be said to have been fulfilled, if this has not been?

But here is the great difficulty. There are passages in God's word which directly and absolutely declare the fulfilment of this very promise. Take two or three. "This good land which the Lord your God hath given you. .. not one thing hath failed of all the good things which the Lord your God spake concerning you." (Josh. xxiii. 13, 14.) "But when the time of the promise drew nigh which God had sworn to Abraham, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt." (Acts. vii. 17.) "Thou art the Lord the God, who didst choose Abram,

and madest a covenant with him to give the land of the Canaanites, &c., to give it, I say, to his seed, and hast performed thy words; for thou art righteous." (Nehem. ix. 7, 8.) Still further; I turn to Solomon's reign, and find the boundaries of the kingdom extending to the limits which God had intimated to the patriarch. "And at that time Solomon held a feast, and all Israel with him, a great congregation from the entering in of Hamath unto the river of Egypt. ... Solomon reigned over all the kingdoms, from the river unto the land of the Philistines, and unto the border of Egypt;" which is thus explained in the "Biblical Encyclopædia: "By his alliance with Egypt and Tyre he held sway over all the countries between the Nile and the Euphrates, and even over some districts beyond the latter river." Whether the "river of Egypt" means the Nile or the Sihor, is of no consequence; God's promise was literally and accurately fulfilled. I see no room, therefore, for any further temporal inheritance to Israel in

respect of this Abrahamic covenant.

(3.) The arguments founded upon the language of the Prophets follow in order. These seem the stronghold of our brethren on the other side; and when any question arises, we are always referred to some sublime passage in Isaiah, which, it must be confessed, often appears very overwhelming at the time; at least with the particular construction put upon it. But, upon sober reflection, many difficulties seem to present themselves as to the fairness and propriety of this construction. I will mention two in connection with the prophets. The