likewise; and it is this which makes the important feature of the story. For any thing that appears, it was hardness of heart and prejudice which made the disciples so slow in comprehending the Prophets; not any inherent difficulty in applying the predictions which they had read to the occurrences which they had seen. At all events, the circumstance recorded by the Evangelist may suggest to us a serious doubt, whether the prin cipai requisite for a profitable perusal of the Scriptures be not something beyond the power of notes and comments to supply.

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The Bishop's second precedent is derived from the Acts of the Apostles. Philip, he observes, was sent to the Ethiopian Eunuch, to show him the spirituality of the prophecies of Isaiah, and the general doctrine of the faith of Christ." The intended inference is, that the Bible should not be intrusted to the common people, unless accompanied either by a teacher or by a commentary. It would hardly appear that the conclusiveness of this inference had been very deeply considered. For can it be seriously maintained, that even a child, with the New Testament-nay, with this very narrative-in his hands, resembles the noble Ethiopian, educated and statedly resident in a heathen country, a recent visiter at Jerusalem, and in whose hearing our blessed Saviour had probably never been named except as a notorious and convicted impostor? The precedent little applies to those who, in the same page that relates the Ethiopian's doubts, find also recorded the decisive manner in which those doubts were resolved. In the case of such persons, the passage, far from proving the want of a commentary, does itself supply the commentary that was wanted, and thus enables them, even without a guide, to " understand what they read."

If, then, the two precedents that

have been just considered, are to be argued from in the unconditional manner of which he who has produced them sets the example,they seem clearly to establish,that the sacred Books require no exposition whatever. For both of them lead us to this consideration, that the Scriptures as we now have them, that is, the Jewish and Christian Scriptures combined, give us, not only doubts, but solutions. The Bible, in this view, is itself both text and commentary, that which was commentary in the days of the Apostles having now become a part of the text. Therefore, arguing broadly and arbitrarily, from these precedents, it would rather follow that all additional commentaries might be discarded, as being at the best superfluities.

But such inferences in the gross are little conducive to the interests of truth. There is no doubt that Scripture contains difficulties which a judicious expositor may often assist in dispelling: neither is there any doubt that a practical commentary may much contribute to edification; and, on both grounds, it is clearly incumbent on Christians, according to their several means and opportunities, to promote the use and circulation of such expositions and commentaries as they honestly judge to be the best and most scriptural. The note and the comment are important as well as the text; the office of circulating, so far as occasions serve, the one, is as obligatory as that of circulating, so far as occasions serve, the other. To this extent all are agreed. But, when we come to estimate the relative importance of these two objects, the comparative force of these two obligations, then it is that a deplorable difference of sen timent arises.

In the opinion of Dr.Wordsworth, (for, in him, we have a right to assume that the expression is an accurate exponent of the thought,) the distribution of explanatory comments and devotional forms is of

almost equal dignity and importance with that of the sacred text itself. In our judgment, on the contrary, such language is rash, unscriptural, and untrue; for the former of those objects is very greatly inferior in dignity and importance to the latter. Nor does this imply any inconsistency. The mathematician talks of his infinites of different orders, and with much more reason may the moralist talk of obligations unequal in their degree. It is not less the duty of a Christian to relieve the temporal necessities of his fellow men, than to minister to their spiritual wants; but, if these duties were in any case to come into conflict, that man would be thought a very indifferent Christian who could hesitate between them a single moment.

To resume, however, our more immediate task-The Bishop of Carlisle repeatedly adverts to the alarm which the proceedings of the Bible Society have occasioned. In a passage which will hereafter be adduced, he even describes this apprehension as having extended to "multitudes." They dread, it seems, the effects which the indiscriminate perusal of the Bible may produce on the bulk of the people.

The intended inference for the Bible Society, we presume, is, Multis terribilis, multos caveto. But surely these multitudes might find some fitter subject for their fears. We believe it to be a very great mistake in point of fact, that persons of the lower orders, when put in possession of a Bible, are apt to be misled or injured by the more difficult or perplexing parts of holy writ. For it very beautifully happens-and it is an additional example of the principle of compensation in the works of Providencethat the same circumstances which in one view increase their danger as readers of the unexplained Scripture, do in another diminish it. This we shall attempt briefly to show, not as a matter of curious observation, but as immediately

bearing on the great question of the circulation of the Bible without note or comment. In truth, having disposed, as we trust, of the precedents referred to by our author, it is natural that we should now directly address ourselves to the disproof of his leading position.

In the first place, if uneducated readers of the Bible are less acute than the learned, they are in the same proportion less fastidious. Their unsophisticated minds thrive on that plain fare which more delicate tastes find homely and unpleasing. They read the simple narrative of the Fall of Man, and they draw from it the obvious moral, without once thinking it necessary to allegorize it into modern philosophy. They peruse the history of Redemption, and they contemplate its mysteries in reverent attention, without once finding it expedient to resolve them into the rational religion of Socinianism. With them the heart is more busy than the discursive faculty, and it teaches them gratefully to receive truths

From which our nicer optics turn away.

It cannot be necessary to quote authorities on so clear a point. That the great perverter of Scripture has been presumptuous of purblind learning, not bumble and unsuspecting ignorance, is a truth now universally known, and always acknowledged,—always, that is, except when it is to be acted upon. Yet, since Lactantius, as we have seen, has been appealed to in the work before us, it may not be uninteresting to show how closely the opinion of that classical writer concurs with the general sentiment on the present subject. In a passage, of which an English translation may more easily represent the sense than the elegance, the Christian Cicero thus delivers himself: "One principal reason why the sacred Scripture finds so little credence with the wise, and learned, and mighty of the present age, is, that

the prophets employ a plain and familiar style, adapted to the intelligence of the common people. They are therefore held cheap by those who desire neither to read nor to bear any thing that is not recommended by polish and eloquence,men, whose minds are incapable of being impressed, except by that which charms their ears with its harmony. Whatever appears low or mean, such persons reject as trifling, puerile, and vulgar. In a word, they regard nothing as true, but that which is agreeable; nothing as worthy of belief, but that which excites pleasurable sensations; and make embellishment, not truth, their standard of value."*

In the second place, it is true that the poor have neither leisure nor learning to understand the more abstruse or mysterious parts of Scripture; but then this want of leisure and learning disinclines, as well as disqualifies them, for the study. Their hours of reading are the hours of lassitude or of sickness." It is not in such seasons that men go laboriously wrong. The scholar and the sophist may read for the purposes of contention; but the humble read that they may be instructed, and the weary and heavy-laden that they may find rest. Their objects are repose, comfort, tranquillity; not vain exercitations of reasoning, or oppositions of science falsely so called. To an uneducated man, the simplest portions of Scripture will naturally prove the

"Nam hæc in primis causa est, cur apud sapientes et doctos et principes hujus sæculi Scriptura Sancta fide careat; quod Prophetæ communi ac simplici sermone, ut ad populum, sunt locuti. Contemnuntur itaque ab iis, qui nihil audire vel legere nisi expolitum ac disertum volunt; nec quicquam inhærere animis eorum potest, nisi quod aures blandiori sono permulcet. Illa verò, quæ sordida videntur, anilia, inepta, vulgaria existimantur. Adeò nihil verum putant, nisi quod auditù suave est; Dihil credibile, nisi quod potest incutere voluptatem; nemo rem veritate ponderat, sed ornatu." Instit. Lib. V. sec. 1.

"Perhaps the Christian volume is his theme,

How Guiltless Blood for guilty man was shed;

How He who bore in heaven the Second Name

Had not on earth whereon to lay his head."*

The Cotter of Burns, indeed, does not altogether confine himself to easy reading; but the Cotter of Burns, it must be remembered, is a person of education.

Now if, in the perusal of these touching compositions, some feeling arises beyond a vague curiosity or a merely transient interest,-if a desire is excited to know more familiarly the mighty and impressive subjects spoken of,-if a sentiment of reverence grows up for the excellence of Revelation and the majesty of its Author,-if a perception, however indistinct or mysterious, is attained, of the powers of the world to come,-if an approach, however faint, is made to that Christian humility on which, as on some low valley, the dews of heaven love to descend,-why must it be supposed a probable consequence, that the mind, which is at one moment thus engaged and impressed, will, in the next, plunge into all the difficulties of skeptical or polemical speculation? Why must it, even on the ordinary principles of human nature, be imagined, that the humble student in question will desert that plain reading which has come home to his heart, for matters of doubtful or delusive disputation? Why must it be thought

* Cotter's Saturday-Night.

that he will not rather recede with instinctive reverence from the dark places of a Revelation which he has learned to respect? Why must it be believed that the impressions his untutored mind has received, may not operate as a preservative against snares which might prove perilous to hardier understandings? Above all, why must it be concluded that the aid of a super-human influence will be wanting, to cherish his faint piety, to give definition to his vague ideas, and to fortify him against the seductions of the tempter? There is surely no absurdity in trusting that such a person may experience the merciful guidance of that Spirit, who is described as ever present to human infirmity,as knocking at the heart for admittance-as waiting to be gracious as anxious (if the figure may be used) for occasions of infusing holy desires, suggesting good counsels, and prompting just works for under such human images as these have the Scriptures been pleased to represent the magnitude, though not the nature, of perfect and passionless goodness.

If this is enthusiasm, it is the enthusiasm of Saint Chrysostom and the Homilies of the Church of England. "God receiveth the learned and unlearned, and casteth away none, but is indifferent unto all. And the Scripture is full, as well of low valleys, plain ways, and easy for every man to use and to walk in, as also of high hills and mountains, which few men can climb unto. And whosoever giveth his mind to holy Scriptures with diligent study and burning desire, it cannot be, saith Saint John Chrysostom, that he should be left without help. For either God Almighty will send him some godly doctor to teach him—as he did to instruct the Eunuch, a nobleman of Ethiopia, and treasurer to Queen Candace; who having a great affection to read the Scripture, although he understood it not, yet for the desire that he had unto God's word, God

sent his Apostle Philip to declare unto him the true sense of the Scripture that he read-or else, if we lack a learned man to instruct and teach us, yet God himself from above will give light unto our minds, and teach us those things which are necessary for us, and wherein we be ignorant. And. in another place, Chrysostom saith, that man's human and worldly wisdom, or science, is not needful to the understanding of Scripture; but the revelation of the Holy Ghost, who inspireth the true meaning unto them that with humility and diligence do search therefore."*

Not the least observable circumstance in this extract, is the purpose for which it introduces the Ethiopian nobleman: a purpose so essentially different, not to say diametrically opposite, from that to which the same history is turned in a passage already cited from the Charge before us. In the one case, the history is quoted to prove that the unaccompanied Scriptures cannot safely be studied by illiterate persons; for they will never be clear to them without a commentator. In the other, it is brought to prove that they may safely be studied by such

persons; for a commentator, or what is better than a commentator, will never be wanting. Opinions are free on all subjects; but, for ourselves, we are much too old-fashioned to hesitate, on this occasion, whether we should side with the Charge or with the Homily, with the Bishop of Carlisle, or with the united authority of Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer.

In answer to these positions, a line of argument may perhaps be adopted, which would by no means be new with the opponents of the Bible Society. All these good effects, it may be said, might indeed flow from the circulation of the Scriptures, even without note or comment, provided they were

* Book of Homilies, p. 6. Oxford Edition, 1802.