tween these two extremes the Italian type of Judaism is intermediate, and this appears to have extended to the old Jewish settlements in the south of France. Those of the northern provinces and of England do not appear in history so strongly marked with a distinctive character.

In order to understand the language of the books, in relation to this subject, it is important to observe that, although local in their origin, these various distinctions are no longer limited to their original localities, but diffused and scattered by repeated transmigrations throughout all regions where the Jews are known. By a Spanish or a German Jew, is not necessarily meant a resident or even a native of Spain or Germany. The terms denote Jews of a certain school, or of a certain race, wherever born or settled. In the great cities, even of America, whole synagogues of Portuguese and German Jews are found, many, perhaps most of them Americans by birth, and yet distinguishable even to the eye. These same distinctions are found also in the remote east, and even in the Holy Land itself. After the Turks had overthrown the Eastern Empire in the fifteenth century, the Jews began once more to settle in those regions, chiefly from the different European countries, for the Jews of the remote East scarcely reappear in history. These emigrants brought with them all their national peculiarities, from which arises the otherwise perplexing fact, that the distinctions, of which we read most frequently, among the oriental Jews, are founded on European national diversities. Hence the constant reference to Spanish, German, and Polish Jews, in missionary journals and reports. Hence, too, the necessity of printing Hebrew-Spanish books for Jews, not in Spain, but in Constantinople and the Turkish provinces. The same thing is true of Palestine itself, where the Jews, however, are less numerous than many are accustomed to imagine. As most of our associations with that country are derived from Scripture, it is often hard, even for the best informed, to bear in mind the repeated and entire change of its inhabitants, and especially to remember that its permanent native population is at present very small, and not of Hebrew but Arabian origin. The Jewish residents in Palestine are still described by travellers as consisting chiefly of poor and aged devotees, who have come, in many cases from afar, to die and be buried in the Land of Promise.

A remarkable fact in the modern history of the Jews is the infrequency of false Messiahs. Delusions of this kind appear to have been most frequent in the times immediately before and after the destruction of Jerusalem. The famous Bar Cochba, or Son of a Star, in the reign of Hadrian, (so called in allusion to Num. xxiv. 17), was afterwards consigned to in

famy among the Jews themselves, under the title of Bar Coziba, or Son of a Lie. In later times the most remarkable case is that of an impostor at Smyrna, in the seventeenth century, who created an extraordinary movement, first in the East, and then throughout the Jewish population of all Europe, but strangely ended his career by becoming a Mahometan himself. The detailed account of this delusion, given by Jost, is highly interesting, and affords a glimpse into a world little. known to general readers. In our own day, fanatical delusions seem to have given way, in Jewry as in Christendom, to sceptical doubts and a very extensive defection from the faith and hope of the preceding generations. The general course of modern Jewish history may, to aid the memory, be summarily stated thus. From the fall of Jerusalem to the establishment of Christianity under Constantine the Great, the Jews, with all their hatred of the Christians, shared their persecutions. This may be laid down as the first great period. After Christianity was established, they enjoyed the patronage of heretics, and especially of the Arians. A critical event in the history of the Jews was the rise of the Mahometan religion. Another was the introduction of the feudal system. Under the first of these, in Egypt, Barbary, and Spain-under the second, in the rest of Europe-they were highly prosperous, and became the money-dealers of the world. As the feudal system gradually passed away, and the existing organization was developed, the Jews lost their advantages, and passed through a period of persecution-regal, ecclesiastical, and popularsometimes resulting in their general expulsion from extensive countries. This spirit of intolerance was still alive and active at the commencement of the Reformation, and the principles of the Reformers were not generally such as to repress it. From the Reformation to the French Revolution, while the Jews suffered actual oppression in some countries, the predo minant feeling towards them was one of contemptuous fearan exaggerated notion of their wealth and cunning, mixed with aversion for their falsehood and duplicity, even among those who cared but little for their unbelief. The French Revolution began the work of their emancipation, which has kept pace with the general progress of liberty. One effect of this has been to withdraw from view those outward social differences which used to strike the eye and the imagination, and to leave them distinguished only by religious peculiarities. The consequence is, that while they have ceased to interest statesmen and men of the world, they have acquired, in the eyes of many Christian philanthropists, a great and even disproportionate importance.

Although the subject has been here presented only as a part

of general history, it is not wholly barren of suggestions in relation to the great cause of Christian philanthropy. Some of these we shall barely indicate, without attempting either proof or illustration. The first thought that occurs to us, in this connection, is that even the hasty glimpse which we have taken of the later Jewish history confirms the claim of that extraordinary people to a place in the benevolent remembrance and exertion of the Christian world. Besides the interest attaching to them as the subjects of prophecy and sacred history, they are too conspicuous in that of later times to be overlooked or treated with indifference. Another inference from this historical review is, that the relative position which it represents the Jews as holding to the Christian world for ages, when taken in connection with the actual condition of the Holy Land, is by far the most plausible foundation for the doctrine, that the Jews are to be restored en masse to Palestine. A people providentially kept separate from every other, yet without a country of their own, while that of their fathers is almost unoccupied, presents a combination and concurrence of events, which may well suggest the thought of some great providential purpose to be yet accomplished by the reunion of the two, without supposing any express promise or prediction in the Scripture. It is indeed much to be desired, that this opinion, which is daily gaining ground, may be allowed to rest upon its true foundation, without any wresting of the Scriptures in support of it. Another danger, in relation to benevolent exertion for the Jews, is that of fostering their national conceit, and the spiritual pride even of true converts, by too marked a separation of their case from that of other objects of Christian benevolence. Whatever advantages may be connected with distinct organizations for this special purpose, and however great the good accomplished by them, which we would not question or extenuate, we think that the most wholesome fruits may be expected from the subjection of this cause to the same general management with others, so that the Jews may be caught in the same net with the Gentiles, and no longer constitute a "several fishery." With these views, we heartily approve of the beginning, which has been already made in this direction, by our own church [the American Presbyterian], through her Board of Missions.

ABT. III.-The Authenticity and Genuineness of the Pentateuch.

Ir is certainly not the part of wisdom to introduce to the public, indiscriminately, the sceptical opinions on morals and religion which prevail in [the Continent of] Europe. Some of these opinions will soon perish on the soil that gave them birth. Before they can be confuted, they will cease to exist.* Other opinions are so interwoven with habits of thinking peculiar to the people of continental Europe; they are the product of a state of society, philosophical and religious, so unlike our own, that the attempt, on our part, to controvert, or even to comprehend them, would be a fruitless labour.

But some of the opinions referred to are not indigenous in France or Germany only. They are by no means exotics in English or American soil. Indeed, not a few of the most destructive theories that prevail in Germany were transplanted from England. The German sceptic is the lineal descendant of men who once figured in English literature. Doubts or disbelief in respect to the doctrines of revelation which exist among us, are the spontaneous growth of our own institutions and habits of thought, and have been only reinforced from abroad. It has been obvious, for a number of years, that there has been an increasing tendency in certain quarters to question or reject the divine authority of the Old Testament. This has been manifest in the case of some individuals who have no special regard for German literature, or who may have even a positive antipathy to it.

While the Old Testament generally is assailed, the Pentateuch is made the subject of special attack. Moses, it is alleged, is the least trustworthy of the Jewish historians, or rather the genuineness of the Pentateuch is denied altogether, and its authorship unceremoniously thrust down to the Babylonish captivity or still later. Many of the miraculous events which it describes are regarded as no better than Rabbinic fables or Grecian myths.

It may be well here to inquire, briefly, into some of the grounds of this prevalent scepticism. Why are the Hebrew Scriptures, and the five books of Moses particularly, subjected to these fresh assaults? Some causes may exist which have hitherto been unknown or comparatively inoperative.

A prominent ground of this sceptical tendency is the injudicious or incorrect method which has been pursued by not a few orthodox interpreters of the Old Testament. They have never

F. A. Wolf is said to have remarked, that "what comes forward in Germany with eclat, may be expected, for the most part, to end, after some ten years, shabbily."

distinctly seen the relations which exist between the Old Testament and the New. They do not, practically at least, recognise the great truth, that God has communicated his revelations gradually. They have looked for the meridian sun in the faint light of the morning. They seem never to have entered into the spirit of the declarations, that Christ brought life and immortality to light, and that the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than the illustrious forerunner of our Lord. In their view, the patriarchs did not see through a glass darkly, but enjoyed almost the perfect vision of the apostles. A system of types, extending to minute particulars, and to bad men, as well as to good, has been forced into the interpretation of the Old Testament, to the detriment of all sound philology, and often of common sense. Men of eminent learning, in our own days, have found in the Mosaic ritual all varieties of allegory and hidden sense, so that, almost literally, every cord has cried out of the tabernacle, and every pin from its timber has answered. In the predictions of the Old Testament, a speciality, or a minute historical reference has been discovered, alike at variance with the nature of prophecy and the actual events of history. In such circumstances, men

.. wearied with the incongruities or absurdities of the annotator, have become distrustful of that on which he has wasted his pains.

Some

Another source of the scepticism in question, is the supposed incompatibility of some of the discoveries of modern learning with the records of the Pentateuch. The students of natural science confidently affirm the indefinite antiquity of our globe, and describe the wonderful operations which were going on in its bosom ages before man was formed upon its surface. of these investigators, it must be confessed, proceed as independently as if the Mosaic records did not exist; or if these ancient documents should chance to cross their track, they brush them aside with as little ceremony as they would the cosmogony of Ovid or the theory of Burnet. On the other hand, some theologians have been unduly sensitive in respect to these conclusions of geology, not remembering that revelation and true science will never be found ultimately at variance, and that the period of their apparent discrepancy is generally short. But instead of waiting for time to unfold the mystery, they have denied or denounced, in their zeal for revelation, the unquestionable facts of science. In these circumstances, a third party interpose, and cut the knot which they cannot untie. They discern no difficulty in the case, for the book of Genesis is a common history, a mixture of things credible and incredible, or it is a highly-seasoned poetical composition. If a discovery of science conflicts with a statement