weakly, who have signalized themselves by great achievements of mental application. Such an individual was Pascal. Such, probably, was Hooker. Such too, in a lower degree, was Doddridge. Does not this prove the mighty influence of mind over the corporeal system? Above all, does not this energy, when apparent in good men, prove the force of religious motives and considerations; those principles, which consist in the fear and love of God; in a sense of duty; in a care of the immortal soul; and in a benevolent wish to promote the best interests of their fellow-creatures? Even setting aside for a moment the sure testimony of the sacred Oracles, can it be imagined that a being of such powers and capacities should be limited to the short span of an earthly existence, and not be destined to a continuance beyond the grave? May we not adopt the fine expressions of a heathen poet, with greater propriety than he could use them :Est Deus in nobis: agitante calescimus illo: Impetus hic sacræ semina mentis habet?

this difference, that Hardouin boldly asserted that the Greek Testament was a translation from the Latin Vulgate; while his modern successor considers it a version of an ancient but unknown Latin copy, which unknown Latin copy might also itself be a version from some unknown Greek original.

(To be continued.)

To the Editorofthe Christian Observer. YOUR biblical readers are doubtless aware that an elaborate work has been lately published, under the title of Palæoromaica, the object of which is to prove that the books of the New Testament were not originally written in Greek but in Latin. This hypothesis was one of the singular paradoxes of that learned semimadman the Jesuit Hardouin*; with

I might have said complete madman, or at least have applied to him what Voltaire remarks of some other person, that if not absolutely a madman, he had a very particular kind of reason; witness his hypothesis that the greater part of our pretended ancient authors are the forgeries of moderns; that Virgil's Æneid, for instance, was composed by a Benedictine monk of the thirteenth century: and a hundred similar absurdities, of which I shall give only the following specimen. I copy a note of Gesner from Zeunius's Horace, not having Har

The mischievous tendency of this strange hypothesis is very apparent; and as the work is written with great research and a professed, though not always well sustained, spirit of candour, it seemed to call for a refutation. This public service has been ably, though briefly, performed by the pious and learned Bishop of St. David's, in a postscript to the second edition of his "Vindication of 1 John. v. 7." The following is a

douin's own book at hand. It relates to

Horace's celebrated ode (Lib. ii. Od. xx.)

“Circa hujus carminis argumentum seipProsopopoeia inquit hæc est Christi triumsum superasse Harduinus hic videtur. phantis, et Judæos alloquentis statim ac resurrexit...... Biformis vocatur Christus quia simul in forma Dei et in forma servi. .... Allegoriæ inquit pars altera sequitur, quæ Fratres Prædicatores sancti Dominici alumnos egregie commendat. Vaticinatur enim Christus se illis præconibus Evangelii sui, per complures orbis provincias volaturum. Alitum album interpretatur candida veste indutum: quæ residunt pelles cruribus aspera, ocreas intelligit quibus Dominicanus crura tegit," &c.

So much for the learned Jesuit's interpretation. I should not, however, have transcribed these ineptic, but for the sake of grounding on them a warning to those who are not Jesuits, how they fall into a similar practice of allegorising and perverting Scripture, under pretence of interpreting it. We may occasionally hear from the lips even of pious men and Protestant divines explications of Scripture scarcely one whit less far-fetched or fanciful than that of father Hardouin. Nor is it any excuse that their glosses are well meant; the learned Jesuit perhaps meant well in applying Horace's Ode to the "boots" and "white vestments" of the Dominican friars. There is great reason, however, to bless God that fanciful interpretations of Scripture seem at present not very prevalent, and are justly exploded by all sober Christians of every denomination.

summary of his lordship's argument; than which nothing can be more conclusive. Its insertion in your pages will be interesting to many of your readers, and may assist in checking the possible spread of so injurious an opinion as that maintained by Father Hardouin and the author of Palæoromaica.

the Christian Scriptures were in Greek.

"The proof," says his lordship, "of the original text of the New Testament, whether Greek or Latin, must lie in a very narrow compass. I shall endeavour to shew this in a few pages; and I take my first step of the proof of a Greek original, by re-asserting the prevalence of the Greek language in the Roman empire at the time of the Apostles, and connecting with it the previous existence of the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the providential precursor of the New.

"If, from the prevalence of the Greek language at the time of the Apostles, we extend our view to the state of the Christian church in its earliest period, we shall find increasing probabilities of a Greek original. All the Gentile churches established by the Apostles in the East were Greek churches; namely, those of Antioch, Ephesus, Galatia, Corinth, Philippi, Thessalonica, &c. "Again; the first bishops of the Church of Rome were either Greek writers or natives of Greece. According to Tertullian, Clemens, the fellow-labourer of St. Paul, was the first bishop of Rome, whose Greek Epistle to the Corinthians is still extant. But whether Clemens or Linus was the first bishop of Rome, they were both Greek writers, though probably natives of Italy. Anencletus was a Greek, and 80 were the greater part of his successors to the middle of the second century. The bishops of Jerusalem, after the expulsion of the Jews by Adrian, were Greeks. From this state of the government of the primitive church by Greek ministers, -Greeks by birth, or in their writings, arises a high probability, that

But

"The works also of the earliest fathers in the church, the contemporaries and immediate successors of the Apostles, were written in Greek. They are altogether silent, as to any Latin original of the New Testament. They say nothing, indeed, of a Greek original by name. their frequent mention of waxaa avrɩruña, without any distinction of name, can mean only Greek originals. The testimony to the Greek original of the Epistle to the Romans given by the Syriac Scholiast, is the more remarkable, because its meaning is reversed by our author: Romait in Syriac, like POMAIKH in Greek, signifying (as was observed by Selden) not the Latin language, but Greek.

"But if we have in the Greek fathers no mention of a Greek original, we have the most express testimony of Jerome and Augustin, that the New Testament, (with the exception of the Gospel of St. Matthew, which some of the fathers supposed to have been written by its author in Hebrew), was originally composed in Greek. Jerome said, that the Greek original of the New Testament was a thing not to be doubted.""

"Of all the [Latin] MSS. of the New Testament, which had been seen by Jerome (and they must have been very numerous), the author of Palæoromaica observes, that 'the whole, perhaps, of the Gospels and Epistles might be versions from the Greek.' Surely this is no immaterial evidence, that Greek was the original text; and this will be more evident, if we retrace the history of the Greek text upwards from the time of Jerome. The Greek edition nearest his time was that of Athanasius. Before him, and early in the same century, Eusebius published an edition by the command. of Constantine. In the third centúry, there were not less than three Greek editions by Origen, Hesychius, and Lucianus. In the second

principles of Christianity: he may not have before him, at all times, every link in the chain of deduction: as a mathematician may have forgotten the precise steps by which he proved a certain proposition; but the proposition he knows to be true, though the stages of proof have escaped his recollection. On these grounds, every reflecting person must agree with the learned prelate above mentioned, in a remark which he elsewhere makes, that, "having once convinced ourselves of the truth of Christianity, it is childish to discuss its falsity: having once satisfied ourselves as to the positive, it is downright absurdity to try the plausibility of the negative."

CLERICUS.

To the Editorofthe Christian Observer. THE ready manner in which you have inserted my two former communications, of Scriptural Illustrations from Burckhardt and Richardson, induces me to present a third, selected from the publications of two or three other modern, and chiefly recent, travellers. I propose to supply you with a series of articles of the same nature; which, I trust, will not only be found in teresting or amusing, but also assist to allure the reader to the more diligent and devotional perusal of those sacred records, whose language, beauties, or statements are intended to be illustrated.

standing of vassalage. These persons, in rows beyond rows, appeared just as my host had described, the offspring of his house, the descendants of his fathers, from age to age: and like brethren, whether holding the highest or the lowest rank, they seemed to gather round their common parent. But perhaps their sense of perfect equality in the mind of their chief, could not be more forciblyshewn,than in the share they took in the objects which appeared to interest his feelings: and as I looked from the elders or leaders of the people, seated immediately around him, to the circles beyond circles of brilliant faces bending eagerly towards him and his guest, (all, from the most respectably clad, to those with hardly a garment covering their active limbs, earnest to evince some attention to

the stranger he bade welcome), I thought I had never before seen so complete an assemblage of fine and animated countenances, both old and young: nor could I suppose a better specimen of the still existing state of the true Arab, nor a more lively picture of the scene which must have presented itself ages ago, in the fields of Haran, when Terah sat in his tent door, surrounded by his sons, and his son's sons, and the people born in his house. The venerable Arabian Sheikh was also seated on the ground, with a piece of carpet spread under him: and, like his ancient Chaldean ancestor, turned to the one side, and to the S. B. other, graciously answering or ques

SCRIPTURAL ILLUSTRATIONS FROM

MODERN TRAVELS.-NO. III.

Gen. xi. 31. "And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haram, his son's son, and Sarai his daughter."

tioning the groups around him, with an interest in them all, which cleared shewed the abiding simplicity of his government, and their obedience."- Sir R. K. Porter's Travels in Persia, vol. ii. p. 303.

Gen. xiv. 3. "The Salt Sea.""Having entered, I sat down by This is what is usually called the my host, and the whole of the perDead Sea. The following is perhaps sons present, to far beyond the the most recent description of this boundaries of the tent (the sides of remarkable scene of desolation, and which were open), seated themselves is deserving particular attention, also without any regard to those not only for its fidelity, but also more civilized ceremonies of subjec- for that devout regard which the tion, the crouching of slaves, or the writer has manifested to the sacred CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 254.

M