done." It must be confessed that the Scriptural grounds for expecting a continuance of miraculous gifts are somewhat precarious. It is true that there is no express limitation of them to a particular age. But there are certain indications tending to support the belief that they belong to the initial stage of Christian development, not to the ordinary conditions of Christian life. On the whole, this conclusion seems fairly warranted, that an expectation of continued miraculous signs is supported by two or three passages taken in their greatest intensity of meaning, and without qualification from other relevant passages, but that the general tenor of Scripture is against it.

In Church history there is no evidence to prove a continuous exercise of miraculous power from and after the Apostolic age. The evidence in favour of the miracles said by the early Fathers to have been wrought in their time is not at all complete or satisfactory, and more than a suspicion of fraud is connected with some of the narratives. Augustine says, "They ask us, Why are not miracles now wrought which you declare to have been wrought formerly? I would tell them that they were then necessary before the world believed, for the very end that the world might believe." He admits that those related as occurring in his own time were not recommended with such authority as to be received without difficulty and doubting.

What is to be said of the claim set up in our own day that an age of miracles is dawning? We must admit without reservation that there is no impossibility in the supposition. God is as able to work miracles now as He was two thousand years ago. We must admit also that the Scriptures nowhere reveal a limit of time within which miracles were to be expected, and beyond which they were not to be hoped for. If it pleased God to do such works in our own day, we ought to expect that He will do them under the same or like conditions as of old. Then such works were done in close connection with the ministry of the word. "The Lord worked with the Apostles confirming the word with signs following." If miracles are signs to confirm the word, we have reason to look with suspicion on wonders that are supposed to be performed for their own sake, or for merely personal ends. We shall be compelled to be incredulous of the therapeutic value of any man's faith, who is neither a pastor nor an evangelist, to whom invalids resort as they would to a physician, and whose prayers are sought as medical prescriptions are sought by his patients. Some cases of alleged cure are to be accounted for by an effect produced upon the nervous system through the force of mental excitement. We are not reluctant to admit that God, who controls second causes, has answered prayers for healing of sickness, either by giving effect to remedies, or in some other way. But it does not follow in either case that a miracle has been wrought to be compared with those of Scripture. We do not in such cases recognize miracle, and fail to discover any occasion for miracle that is recognized as such in the Word of God.

THE DOCTRINE OF THE "TESTIMONIUM SPIRITUS SANCTI" IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. By the Rev. PRINCIPAL SIMON, Edinburgh (Bibliotheca Sacra).—The Reformation originated in practical rather than in theoretical needs. The first leaders of the movement objected to certain practices, and desired certain reforms; but they believed that if only a general council could be held, everything might be done or removed that was necessary. This fact led to their touching doctrine only so far as practical interests required it. This is specially the case with the doctrina de deo. But the new experiences which the Reformers realized opened their eyes to new aspects of truth. The Romish Church had cast into obscurity the function of the Holy Spirit in the Christian life. The Holy Spirit was held to dwell in the

Church as a whole: individuals could share in His influences solely through the Church.

The attention of the Reformers was first directed to the practical aspect of the witness of the Spirit; and the assurance of forgiveness through Christ, and of acceptance with God, was traced to it. By degrees the intellectual aspect arose into view the Spirit's witness to the Divine origin and authority of the Word of God. In the writings of Luther both aspects of the doctrine are represented, but the practical is referred to with most distinctness and frequency. "The Spirit gives us a good conscience by letting us hear His secret whisper or prompting, 'Thy sins are forgiven thee.' "It is the Holy Spirit who enables us to discern that the

Scripture is truth."

Melanchthon's references to the doctrine in both its aspects are rare and vague. He does not seem to have got the length of regarding the witness of the Spirit as a constitutive element of the higher Christian life. The Lutheran theologians down to the close of the sixteenth century follow Melanchthon rather than Luther. They insist on the possibility of certain assurance of forgiveness, and hint no doubt as to the Divine origin of Scripture.

With Hunnius (1550-1603) a new departure is made. He is the first to treat the doctrine in a more formal manner. He distinctly connects the matter of internal certitude with the witness of the Spirit, though he does not enter into an examination of its method and scope. "God confirms His grace towards us, not only by a verbal promise, but by a most sacred oath; yea, also seals it efficaciously by His Spirit in the hearts of the elect, in order that they might certainly know themselves to be the sons of God." And with regard to the intellectual aspect of the Spirit's witness, he says, "God Himself seals the certitude of the truth of the prophetic and apostolic doctrine in the hearts of His saints by the earnest of His Spirit."

The teaching of Baier (1647-1695), which influenced many generations of German students, in the matter of certitude reduces the element of directness in the Spirit's witness to that of mere inference-the Spirit establishes as it were the truth of one of the premises from which the believer argues that he is a true believer, and therefore a true son of God. And while apparently recognizing the witness of the Spirit as something over and above the other evidences for the Divine origin and authority of Scripture, he really identifies the two, or, at any rate, reduces the Spirit's witness to his work in rendering those other arguments efficacious. The generation that succeeded him soon distinctly resolved the witness of the Spirit practically into a matter of inference from states of mind which the Spirit was still held to have generated; intellectually into an inference from the effects, especially on the moral and religious nature of man and on his feelings, produced by Scripture or by its truths-effects, however, which for some time continued to be deemed unproducible without the Spirit's co-operation. As far as the Lutheran Church is concerned, Baier closes the seventeenth and inaugurates the eighteenth century, under whose ban the mind of Christendom is still largely living.

NATURAL RELIGION PROPHETIC OF REVELATION. F. P. NOBLE, Chicago, Illinois (Bibliotheca Sacra).—This article is a very valuable one from the side of comparative theology, and unfolds a new chapter in Christian evidences. Much that it contains will be new even to those whose reading has been very extensive. The conclusion to which the writer comes, after investigation into the principal religious systems that have prevailed in the world, is that there has been a Messianic prophecy among the Gentiles, and that the ethnic creeds all speak in their tongues of God's ever

lasting power and divinity, and that in every age and clime the human heart has had intuition, sometimes of one, elsewhere of others, of the spiritual truths divinely revealed in Holy Writ. This very attractive position is maintained by full and most remarkable quotations from the sacred literature of ancient Egypt, Babylon, China, Hindostan, and Persia, and by briefer references to classical mythology and to the teaching of Mahommed. The article concludes :—

...

"It would have been feasible to glean among the beliefs of Africa, America, and Australia. We should find other sheaves making obeisance to the sheaf of Christianity as it arises and stands upright. But it is enough to cite the testimony of the peoples in Asia and Europe who have marched in the van, or have shaped the lineaments of humanity with fingers of fate. They refute the objection that the ethnic religions are at bottom only a worship of different aspects and forces of nature; that that religion which is now called the Christian was in existence with the ancients too, and was never wanting from the very beginning of the human race'; and that Christianity is but a natural religion. For such theories as that of sun-myths fail to explain the larger and more important elements in religious myths-the personality, the spiritual attributes of the Divine powers. Moreover, the thoughts of men deepen through the ages; the religious faculty that had been unable to disentangle things of sense from things of spirit, nature from God, comes to perceive the Divine beyond the universe. Lastly, the closer the study of the likeness between our Faith and the human systems, the deeper does investigation prove their difference to be. Blot the sun from the sky, and leave only six or seven of the most distant stars to pierce the midnight darkness; then you gain the true idea of what has been the spiritual ignorance and the moral helplessness, century after century, of the untold millions upon millions who saw not the Light of the World, for those who knew the sublime truths whispered by the ancient religions were but a handful to the weak and blind. But with Jesus something came into the world that was never here before and has never left us since-Christianity, in opposition to the religions where man seeks God, 'is God seeking man.' Of the Platonists, for example, Augustine remarked that 'their pages contained not this. They aroused a warmth and enthusiasm, but none there sang, "Of God cometh my salvation," none there heard Him calling, "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." It was one thing to see the land of peace, yet not find the way thither, and another to keep the way, being guarded by the host of the heavenly Guide.'

"When the sons of man, the son of God, looked in the West for the true saint; or awaited the avatars of Vishnu and of another Buddha; or expected Sosiosh, Bringer of Salvation; or looked back to Osiris in Egypt, and to Hiawatha among the Indians; or in Mexico hoped for the return of Quetzalcoatl to restore righteousness; or through Cumæan sibyls prophesied a deliverer, and a golden age of holiness; or declared that Balder, sacrifice of Loki's sin, should return from hell-they were, although they knew it not, bringing frankincense and myrrh to the Desire of all nations. Man's heart has been a harp of Heaven, though many a chord rang false, and it has echoed the strain of

'One far-off divine event

To which the whole creation moves.' 329

CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE AS A SOURCE OF DOCTRINE. REV. F. H. FOSTER, PH. D., Oberlin Theological Seminary (Bibliotheca Sacra).—Christian experience has two aspects, individual and catholic. Individual Christian experience is the sum of those facts of consciousness which any individual Christian has as a Christian, e.g., the new birth as a change of purpose, fundamental, renewing, producing a new relation with God, is a fact of the consciousness of the individual. Forgiveness of sin, or peace following upon change and surrender, is also a fact of consciousness. So is growth in grace, and so are the beneficial effects of accepting and acting upon certain forms of religious opinion. As there is an individual, so there is, if we can get at it, a catholic Christian experience. Christianity has been in the world for now nearly nineteen

hundred years. Christians have been of all ages, of both sexes, of every condition of life, have inhabited every clime, have passed through every change of civilization, and now, in their present broad distribution over the whole earth, reflect as in a mirror all that they have ever been. How can we get at this catholic experience in such a form as to enable us to use it ?

Catholic experience is, first, deposited in the Bible. The Bible is largely a record of the experience and opinions of a body of men who are particularly well fitted to have a normal and hence catholic experience. In the writings of the great teachers of the Church we have a second deposit of Christian experience. The creeds, which have at various times been adopted as the standards of the Church, and the devotional utterances which have expressed religious emotion, present a growing harmony as to an ever-enlarging circle of truth, and underneath the outward variations we find a surprising agreement on fundamental and elementary truths. We may acknowledge this without accepting the Roman Catholic doctrine of an infallible Church as the necessary interpreter of the Bible. The voice of the Church has a great place by way of instruction and guidance.

It may be well to note that Christian experience is not infallible. The Church at several points has gone astray with one consent. Nor is Christian experience equally valuable for all parts of the system of doctrine. The doctrine of the Trinity, e.g., requires revelation to make it clear. Individual experience can give no detailed deliverances upon the future world, nor has catholic experience much to say about it. Nor is Christian experience always positive in its utterances. On such a point as the proper qualifications of communicants at the Lord's Table wc find no general consent. Christian experience is like a harvest-field, in parts of which there is nothing worth gathering, in other parts of which there is a wealth of golden grain. It cannot be regarded as the sole source of Christian dogmatics, but yet may be used to give results in harmony with other sources of information, so that the final result, the system, may be founded upon the combined testimony of all accessible witnesses. Just as natural history is to be learned by studying the facts of nature, so theology, which is in some departments the natural history of the renewed soul, is to be learned, not only by the instructions of men who spake under the immediate Divine guidance, but also from the facts of the life of that renewed soul.

THE GENESIS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, WITH A FEW WORDS RESPECTING HIGHER CRITICISM. By PROFESSOR L. T. TOWNSEND, S.T.D., Boston, Mass. (Methodist Review).-Though the expression of a personal opinion on a subject before thorough investigation of it has been made is unscientific, there are sometimes advantages in stating one's opinion frankly at the outset of a discussion. Professor Townsend adopts this plan, and states his position in the following terms:-"The Bible as a whole is a God-made and a man-made book; so far as it is God-made, it is, all things considered, the best book possible, being just the book God intended it should be; and, so far as it is man-made, it shows in its mechanical structure, as other books show, the thought of a human mind and the touch of a human hand; it is the only sufficient and invariable rule of religion' known to the world; its canon was fixed by inspired men as God would have it; henceforth it is incapable of addition or diminution '; and, so far as the New Testament is concerned, the books composing it were written by the men whose names they bear, and its canon was settled before the death and by the authority of John the Apostle."

Before presenting the evidence in support of these positions, reference is made to what are called the "advanced men," and it is affirmed that "if their attitude is

generally recognized as unfriendly to Christianity, they are themselves responsible for making that impression." So long as they bring genuine historical, philological, ethnological, topographical, or archæological facts to bear on Christian Biblical positions, their service must be gratefully acknowledged; but when they demand acceptance for their theories built on these facts, we may properly hesitate, and inquire whether these are the only or the absolutely necessary theories. Recent progressive critics speak of the Bible in ways that show a high estimate of its value. Specimens are given from Briggs, Ladd, and Newman Smyth, but their conclusions are shown to be destructive of faith in the trustworthiness and authority of the Book. Illustration is taken from the varied views propounded concerning the Pentateuch or Hexateuch. It is said that "it is high time our American advanced critics' knew that the best scholarship of the world now concedes that the large body of the legislation, both civil and ceremonial, found in the Pentateuch is genuinely Mosaic, and that Moses was the first to build the Pentateuch into a connected whole. Ezra may have revised and amended that first edition, and Malachi may have made a second revision, but the work of neither of these inspired revisers imperilled in the least the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch." Referring to the statement that a hundred thousand mistakes have been discovered in our version of the Bible by the comparison of manuscripts, the Professor points out the insignificance of most of them, and declares that there is no instance of a 'nistake involving the modifying of a doctrine of revealed religion.

The review of the historical evidence for the genuineness of the New Testament follows the lines familiar to every Bible student. Polycarp, Justin Martyr, the Muratorian Catalogue, Irenæus, and Tertullian are brought to give their testimonies, but it must be admitted that historic evidence directly bearing on the formation of the New Testament Canon is wanting, and we must be satisfied with the reasonable assumptions which the Professor thinks are satisfyingly reasonable. The treatment of the subject is to be continued in the next issue of the Review.

REGENERATION AS A FORCE IN REFORM MOVEMENTS. By REV. C. M. Morse, New Wilmington, Pa. (Methodist Review).—"The great question before the people to-day is the problem of just and equitable distribution of wealth." This is virtually the text of this article; and it is designed to show that regeneration, being wholly a moral and spiritual force, has not proved efficient to deal with social difficulties, and that some new force must be added to the regenerative.

Reviewing the work of the Social Reformers, their organizations are mentioned, and their political, philanthropic, and national influences appraised. "They have made their work the theme of conversation in many homes." Organized Christianity is then reviewed, and criticized as inefficient. "She moulds the thought and conduct of her adherents, confining them within the walls built in a past age and a ruder civilization, and hence becomes either a mighty agency for reform or a tremendous obstacle in the way of progress." "The reform spirit has gained the earnest attention of every social organization except the Church." It is admitted that all social questions must finally be settled by appeal to the law of God; but Jesus and His Apostles recognized social problems, and gave laws concerning them.

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Regeneration—making new-involves (1) faith in the Founder of the Christian religion; (2) thought, investigation, knowledge, embracing all the facts in question concerning the welfare of humanity; and (3) obedience to the precepts of and imitation of the example of those who organized the Christian Church. The first of these three elements is universally insisted on, while the remaining principles are either