σκάνδαλον and σκανδαλίζω are peculiar to the writers of the New Testament and the Greek translators of the Old and it is from the same deficiency in the Latin language, that we may account for the reception of these Grecisms into the Vulgate version, as is universally the case in the New Testament, while in the Old the passages, in which the same words occur in the Greek, are in the Latin version variously and paraphrastically expressed. And this fact may be remarked, by the bye, as affording an internal evidence of the Vulgate version of the Old Testament having been made from the original Hebrew and not from the Greek.

66

In our own version, " Offences" and to "Offend," occur throughout the New Testament, where the words of the Greek are σκάνδαλον and σκανδαλίζω, except in four passages in the Epistles, and one in the Revelations, in which " stumbling-block," or "occasion to fall," or "stumble," are used'. In the Old Testament, on the contrary, the expressions vary in different passages; and probably for the same reason we assigned in the case of the Vulgate, viz. that the translation of this part of the Bible was made from the Hebrew; for the variations do not accord with those of the Vulgate, so as to give any ground for supposing the authors of our version to have been guided by it.

1 Rom. xi. 9; xiv. 13. 1 Cor. i. 23.

1 John, ii. 10. Rev. ii. 14.

66

A further proof of this is, that in the Rhemish version, which was professedly made from the Vulgate, the same word, "scandal" and "scandalize," are everywhere retained in the English: and with better reason than many of the other foreign words adopted into that version; as these may be considered no greater deviation from the common idiom, than the terms, offences" and "offend," which our translators have preferred. Either probably may now, from use, be sufficiently understood to mean whatever prevents any one from receiving the Gospel, or gives occasion for him, who has received it, to fall into error in belief, or sin in practice. And what our Saviour tells us is, that it is impossible but what there should be such things; but woe to him by whom they come. It is impossible, that is, but what there should be many things to make the reception of the Gospel in the first instance difficult; and many things to make it hard for those, who have received it, to hold fast by their profession it is impossible, but what there should be many sources of error in the world; many snares for the incautious, many obstacles to the weak, and many temptations to all but whenever any such things are by the fault of men, heavy will be the guilt of those persons, and heavy will be their punishment.

"It is impossible but that offences will come, but woe unto him through whom they come."

Now, if we consider this world as a state of individual probation, and dwell upon the thought of judgment being exercised hereafter on every man, according as he shall have done on earth, it may seem to us startling and mysterious, that it should be in the power of any man to cause another to sin. Individual responsibility seems to imply complete independent free-agency: and the notion of the conduct of one man being the cause of sin to another may appear to militate against this. It would seem much, that the state of one child of Adam should be seriously affected by the conduct of another, even in this world. But when we are told, that this influence may extend not to this world only, but through all the countless ages of eternity that when millions of years have rolled away, and millions more added to them, the lot of one immortal soul may still be cast for good or ill; for weal or woe; in consequence of an influence exerted upon it by the actions of another; it is indeed the most serious and awful consideration that can be offered to the mind.

Still, stupendous as such reflections are, a little consideration will show us, that there is nothing in this idea, which does not accord with the whole scheme of God's Providence. It is but part of that inscrutable plan, in which he has willed that his creatures should be mutually dependent upon each other for all the good they enjoy. It is but part

of that mysterious chain, in which it has pleased the Creator to bind together the generations of men in the cords of sympathy; so as to make them in all things ministers to each other, voluntary, responsible ministers of the good and evil He has placed within their reach.

We see the same principle at work throughout the whole state of man on earth. How much of the earthly prosperity of each individual depends upon others. How little does man stand alone, the architect of his own fortunes, as regards the external circumstances of station, honour, or wealth. How are the powers of his mind developed only by education and culture given by others. How are his affections and his hopes knit up in the attachments and sympathies of domestic life. How, in short, in every part of our earthly state is it not plainly marked, that man is not a solitary and independent, but a social being; the very condition of whose existence is a community both of enjoyment and suffering; and a participation with his fellows of that mingled good and evil, which is woven into the web of life.

The same principle, which pervades our natural and social, extends also to our moral state; the springs of which too are acted upon by impulse from without, and whose finely-tuned chords vibrate to the touch of the hands of others. Hence have we mutual encouragement and support, mutual

temptation, mutual help. The strength of one communicated to another: the weakness of one enfeebling another: the diseases of the moral world disseminating their infection, and spreading their contamination around as certainly as those of the natural; and the sorrows, which are the sad consequences of those moral diseases, following as surely in their train. So that the declaration of the Decalogue, that God would visit the sins of the fathers upon the children until the third and fourth generation, and show mercy unto thousands in them that love Him, was no new and arbitrary law, forming an exception to the general plan of his government; but is rather to be considered as an express declaration of that system of Providence, which was established in the beginning, and had been in operation since the world began, in which, by laws inscrutable to us, but which we doubt not are most excellent and supremely good, He has extended even to his moral responsibility the social character of man; and has hidden in the abyss of eternity the ultimate outgoings of that mysterious influence, which mind as surely exercises upon mind, as matter is acted upon by the matter around.

The system of revealed religion again proceeds on the same plan: this very analogy, while we admit its mysteriousness, affording an argument for its truth. In no respect does the Gospel ad