uity. This is an easier solution than ther that of the sceptics who mainin that Jehovah is a much more odern name, and that Exodus is unstorical, or that of Mr. Tyler, whose eory requires him to contradict or plain away the explicit declaration God to Moses. In our opinion Mr. Tyler is far ore successful in showing that the Lord" of the New Testament, denating the Christ, is frequently the presentative of the Hebrew Jehovah the ancient prophecies. And the esent volume, which is mainly deted to the demonstration of this fact, mprises a body of exact and elegant iticism, which loses none of its charm force from the reverent spirit that rvades the whole. If an exact owledge of language is one of the es essential to the vision of God's ith in critical inquiries, a reverenl spirit is assuredly the other. There no student of scripture criticism who ill not welcome Mr. Tyler's two little lumes, since even where he does not ake converts he will make friends. ebrew Servitude and American Slavery. By JOHN KENNEDY, A.M. Jackson, Walford, & Hodder. If this pamphlet had come to hand fore the publication of our recent ticle on the subject we should have en thankful to fortify our case by me extracts from its pages. Mr. ennedy has conducted a very wellstained attack against the abominaons of American slavery, deriving his eapons from the arsenal of the ebrew Scriptures. While the evil as assailed exclusively by moral arguent it was constantly losing power, id the present treatise deserves onourable mention as among the best nd briefest forms of a testimony which Imits of no valid reply. Take away om the Southerner his fancied suport in the Mosaic slavery, and his hief weapon is broken in his hand. The Last Times and the Great Consummation. An earnest Discussion of Momentous Themes. By Dr. SEISS. Wertheim & Macintosh. 1863. This is a defence, by a learned American divine, of the pre-millennial advent, and is worthy to be ranked in point of execution with the writings of Mr. Birks. The author deals with the argument founded on the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians in a manner which deserves more attention than that argument has commonly received from the antagonists of his opinion. As the period fixed by the generality of pre-millennial writers for the overthrow of European despotism and imposture approaches, we anticipate a revival of the study of chronological prophecy, and not even all that Dr. Cumming has done to discredit such studies will avail to quash the inquiry into the Scripture doctrine on the place which the promised return of Christ from the Heavens occupies in the "plan of the ages." When such men as the Dean of Canterbury or Dr. Seiss are found to maintain the ancient belief that from the existing corruptions of society will be developed a real and living Antichrist, and that this great Antichrist will be destroyed by the personal advent of Christ from heaven, it will be inferred by candid minds that in all probability_the opinion is not so wholly absurd as some persons imagine, and that, at all events, it deserves candid attention. The present volume will assist the studies of those who take an interest in the "things that shall come to pass hereafter," and we the more willingly recommend it as advocating a peculiar opinion, because it does so with the fervour of an intense conviction. It is to be feared that no real belief in the New Testament will, in the present day, earn for anyone the general reputation of sobriety. A genuine Felix will impute "madness" to a genuine Paul to the end of the chapter, and Paul must even consent to endure the imputation until "the day shall declare" the wisdom of those who have "looked for God's Son from Heaven, even Jesus that delivered us from the wrath to come." Thus much we will boldly venture to say, expressing, however, at the same time, our own conviction of the presence of great errors in the interpretations and the chronology of the party whom the author represents. We anticipate nei ther the end of this age in the present decade, nor a "personal reign" of Christ on earth at Jerusalem. Calumnies Confuted. Historical Facts in answer to the Quarterly Review on the Bicentenary Cominemoration. By JOSHUA WILSON. Jackson, Walford, & Hodder. Better late than never. Mr. Wilson has here related the story of 1662 in a compendious form, yet with much variety of interesting detail. We do not think that the clergy will find his mode of stating the question of subscription at all more agreeable than some of those against which Mr. Wilson himself remonstrated last year. The "word of the Lord" is a "sharp twoedged sword," and if you are faithful in the use of it, it will inevitably wound those whom it strikes for insincerity, oil it as you may. History against Colenso: Examination of the Witnesses. By a BARRISTER. Wertheim, Macintosh, & Co. 1863. It would be futile to attempt to notice even the titles of the numerous pamphlets which issue monthly from the press in reply to the Bishop of Natal. They have one common characteristic they express a strong persuasion of the substantial truth of the Old Testament histories-and this is a result for which it is worth while to have endured the recent theological commotion. The tractate above noted offers a respectable specimen of the replies to the Bishop set forth by laymen, with the special recommendation of bearing the traces of a legal hand. The author has no pretentions to be regarded as a learned theologian, or even as a very accurate writer; but, being well acquainted with his Bible, and possessing a fair knowledge of classical history, his common sense appears to have been profoundly shocked by the conclusions which Dr. Colenso has reached in relation to the Pentateuch. He thinks that the application of the Colensian principles of criticism to Greek and Roman history, even after its modern revision, would result in its utter explosion. Doubtless pamphlets of this description have their use, especially in the circle in which the writers exert a personal influence; and the expression of a welleducated layman's opinion of the genuineness and truth of the Pentadeserving of attention. Certainly that teuch is a species of evidence not unmust have been a wonderful forgery which succeeds in making most thoughtful men believe that it was no forgery, the more they consider it. A Short Historical Explanation of the Seals and Trumpets. By. the Rev. WILLIAM DIGBY. Translated from the French. Wertheim, Macintosh, & Co. This work has been published by the society for printing religious books at Toulouse. It has been rendered from the French into English apparently by the author. It breathes a spirit of piety, and expresses a sound religious opinion in relation to the essentials of the Christian faith, and their corruption in the Europea churches. Inasmuch as the general principles of the Apocalypse underli most of the popular Protestant interpretations, we believe that such publi cations as the present are useful të certain classes of minds who can recognize abstract truth only in a very concrete form. For ourselves, althoug well enough disposed to find tenhorned beasts in European history, and even to admit the old Protestant application of the Apocalyptic symbols as susceptible of a better defence than Mr. Porter would allow, we shall be excused from professing conversion to Mr. Digby's special doctrine on the "seals and trumpets." He agrees in the main with Mr. Elliott's school and looks for the advent of Christ is 1866. On the principles of interpre tation maintained by these gentlemer. we do not see why almost any event in human history may not be regarded as a "seal," as a "vial," or a "trumpet. You might fit the whole Apocalype with a series of fulfilments from the history of ancient Rome itself, beginning with Romulus and Remus. Al you require is the usual cycle of famine, pestilence, and war. THE CHRISTIAN SPECTATOR. SEPTEMBER, 1863. CHRISTMAS EVANS.* LSH preaching is as great a mystery to an Englishman as the lsh language. He has heard of it as something little short of miraculous; but as he is ignorant of the language, he is not able nalyze it nor to put himself in the place of a hearer, and to ge for himself of its power. Yet he is assured on good authority t it is immeasurably superior to the best English preaching; , remembering that the English pulpit can boast of a Hall, a almers, and a Melvill, he begins to suppose that Welsh preachmust be superhuman-something to which the angels would to listen if Welsh were but the language of Paradise. It cannot translated, it cannot be reproduced in an English form the uty, the inexplicable charm, vanishes if you attempt to convey hrough any other medium. One of the men to whom the Welsh pulpit owes some of its cipal glory is Christmas Evans. He was born on Christmas , 1766, at a village called Llandyssul, prettily situated amongst Cardiganshire hills. His father was a shoemaker, and does not m to have been distinguished amongst men of his class; nor s it appear that his mother had any extraordinary endowment t will account fort he remarkable ability of her distinguished - The father dying when Christmas was only nine years old, he no education, but was obliged to leave home immediately, and his living as a herd's boy. Amidst much hardship he grew up rge-boned, muscular, and somewhat passionate young man. In er respects he gave no signs of the great powers that lay slumberwithin him. At seventeen or eighteen years of age, at the time great religious excitement, "the day of grace dawned upon his fit," to use his own words, and he became a member of the istian Church. With the help of some of his companions, it *A Memoir. By the Rev. D. M. EVANS. J. Heaton & Son, London. was then that he first learnt to read the Welsh Bible. Under the friendly patronage of a tailor in the village he began to make hi first efforts at "exhortation ;" and soon he seems to have been inspired with the fixed purpose of entering the ministry. He was often heard by unsuspected auditors declaiming sermons to the air But his first public sermon was stolen from Bishop Beveridge' "Thesaurus Theologicus," and his first prayer from the late Griffiti Jones, of Llanddawror. In a week or so the theft was detected, much to his humiliation, and we dare say also much to his profit. In after years, however, in giving the charge to a young minister, he wa guilty of the following "doubtful morality" in reference to the appropriation of other men's labours:-" You may steal the iron brother, if you like, but be sure you always make your own nails then, if needs be, you can swear they are your own property." Al the formal education he received as the preparation for his work was during six months he spent under the care of the Rev. D Davies, of Castell-Hywel. Whatever else he learnt and knew was the fruit of his own solitary encounters with ignorance and darkness. At the age of twenty-two he was baptised at Aberdu by the Rev. Timothy Thomas, the minister of the church there whose character is amusingly illustrated by the following account "A member of the church of Aberduar had to stand his trial o the charge of having literally knocked down an Unitarian in a dis cussion. The trial proceeded in the following extraordinary fashion:"Well, Thomas," said the pastor, in his very hurried and abrup manner, "I am sorry to hear that you are charged with some mis conduct during the last week; let us hear all about it." Th culprit, looking very humble and penitent began to confess: "1 tell the whole truth, sir, the facts are these-Jack the miller an myself were having a little beer together at the Red Dragon, and"Stop, Thomas; let me ask you, before you go any further, did yo pay for it?" "I did, sir," says the criminal very emphatically, an with a gleam of hope twinkling in his eye. "That is in you favour, Thomas-decidedly in your favour. When I take a drop ale I always pay for it; I cannot bear those fellows who go abou tippling at other people's expense: go on, Thomas." Well, s after a while we got into a discussion about Jesus Christ; I, course, holding that he was divine, and Jack that he was only man; and he said such shocking things, that-flesh and blood, y know, are weak, sir; I couldn't stand it any longer; so I am sorry t say, sir, I was tempted to hit him." "So you really struck hit Thomas, did you? But what did he say?" "He actually sai sir, that the blood of Christ had no more virtue in it than the bloo of a beast, and'-encouraged by the significant tones of the pastor"I knocked him down." "Well, brother," said the minister, wit a fine touch of genuine unpriestly sympathy, "I cannot say you d 46 he right thing; but I must say this, I believe I should have done o too: go and sin no more. Christmas Evans first settled as a minister in a place called Lleyn, Carnarvonshire. It seems to have been a poor place, and yet it was bout this time that he ventured upon matrimony, and espoused a pod sensible wife in the person of one Catherine Jones. Mr. Evans ives us a graphic picture of him and his scanty literature, consisting f his Bible, his borrowed Welsh and English dictionary, and Burkitt n the New Testament, "which it is said he would often study in ed with the said dictionary at hand, to look up all the hard words e encountered." Here it was that his preaching took shape. Up > this time he seems to have been struggling to get his ideas ad oratory into the form that should be most satisfying to is aspirations, and had not succeeded. But now God had nt him a teacher. One Robert Roberts, a Calvinistic Methodist reacher, of Carnarvonshire, a deformed, weakly-looking man, but 1 inspired preacher, did for Christmas Evans that which Socrates ided himself in doing for the ideas of others-helping them to e birth. Christmas Evans, when asked whether he could give y account of what led him into his peculiar way of preaching, plied: “Yes, I can, partly at least; I had the ideas before, but mehow couldn't get at them. When I was in Lleyn, the Methosts had a man of the name of Robert Roberts, of Llanlly fui, who as very popular, and there was a great deal of talk about him. Well, I went on one Sunday afternoon to hear him. He was one the most insignificant looking persons I ever saw-a little hunchcked man; but he neither thought nor said anything like other ople; there was something wonderful and uncommon about him. his Robert Roberts gave me the key." At the end of two years we find him leaving Lleyn, and settling Anglesea as a sort of evangelist to ten preaching stations, at a lary of seventeen pounds a year. Not pausing to ask how this eat-boned man, six feet high, and his wife, could manage to live on seven shillings a week, we go on to say that it was here he ent the greater part of his life as a minister-that is not less an thirty-four years. This was the period of his great glory as a eacher. It was now that he began to make those frequent preachg tours into South Wales which were made ever-memorable by s wonderful sermons at the great associations. Mr. Evans has ven so graphic a picture of his great namesake preaching at one these gatherings, that, though it has been quoted before, we cant help extracting it :-" Meanwhile, in the midst of a too general m and restlessness, the preacher had read for his text: And you at were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked rks, yet now hath He reconciled in the body of His flesh through ath, to present you holy and unblameable, and unreproachable ་ |