Dr. Bushnell says of himself, that "so far from suffering the least consciousness of restraint or oppression, under any creed, I have been the readier to accept as great a number as fell in my way; for when they are subjected to the deepest chemistry of thought, that which descends to the point of relationship between the form of the truth and its interior formless nature, they become thereupon so elastic, and run so freely into each other, that one seldom need have any difficulty in accepting as many as are offered him.”— P. 82. A theologian who can make such an avowal as this, is no longer worthy of the confidence of the church in any faith he professes to believe. Such a principle, carried out, would undermine the very foundations of religious faith. Our author gives us a practical illustration in the facility with which he receives and advocates nearly every heresy that has been broached in relation to the Person of Christ-some of them absolutely contradictory and irreconcilable, except on the principle that it is all one whether we receive every creed that is offered or none at all.

1. He "accepts" the heresy of the Docetæ, that the human or bodily appearance of Christ was a phantasm. He says, "The reality of Christ is what he expresses of God, not what he is in his physical conditions."-P. 156. "God certainly is able to assume the human, to become incarnate in it so far as to express his union to it."-P. 157. Again, he says:-"Just as the Logos is incarnated in the flesh, so the Spirit makes his advent under physical signs."-P. 172. Now, what does this mean but that, in the composition of Christ, there was only the appearance of "flesh," and not "flesh" in reality, just as in the advent of the Holy Ghost, the "wind" and the "flames were signs and not realities? But, again, he absolutely scouts at those "whose nature it is to live in their logic, and not in simple insight," and who receive the incarnation not as a "poem," to be measured by "their imagination or by their heart," but as a "verity." "Indeed you may figure," says he, "this whole tribe of sophisters as a man standing before that most beautiful and wondrous work of art, the 'Beatified Spirit' of Guido, and there commencing a quarrel with the artist that he should be so absurd as to think of making a beatified spirit out of mere linseed, ochres, and oxydes! Would it not be more dignified to let the pigments go, and take the expression of the canvass? Just so [mark this!] are the human personality, the obedient, subject, suffering state of Jesus, all to be taken as COLOURS of the Divine, and we are not to fool ourselves in practising our logic on the colours, but to seize at once upon the Divine import and significance thereof."-P. 159. Thus does Dr. Bushnell teach Doceæ

ism. Between the Christ he here describes, and that exhibited in the Bible, there is precisely the difference that exists between a spectre and a man.

2. Again, Dr. Bushnell "accepts" the doctrine of the Apollinarians-directly opposed to that of the Doceta-that Christ had a real body, but not a human soul. Their doctrine was, that the Logos supplied the place of a human soul in the person of Christ. Dr. Bushnell speaks of the inconsistency of measuring the person of Christ "by his body;" and, again, "that the body of Christ evidently grew up from infancy." But what as to his soul? In replying to the argument of the Trinitarian, that it is the "human soul in the person of Jesus," that "obeys, worships, and suffers;" he says the argument "does an affront to the plain language of Scripture." He says that "Christ himself declared, not that a human soul, hid in his person, was placed under limitations, but more-that the Son, that is, the Divine person" was thus subject. Again he says:-"The supposition of a human soul existing distinctly, and acting by itself, clears no difficulty;" but it "creates difficulties a hundred-fold greater than any that it solves."-P. 154. Then he enters into an argument to show the perplexity which the supposition of a human soul in Christ must occasion to the mind of the inquirer; and also the absurdity of supposing that "the redemption of the world is hung upon the human passibilities" of a man who is so closely allied to God. And the conclusion he reaches is, that "there is no solid foundation for the common Trinitarian theory of two distinct or distinctly active subsistences in the person of Christ. It is not Scriptural. It accounts for nothing. It only creates even greater difficulties."-P. 155. Then anticipating an objection from both the Unitarian and the Trini-. tarian against this subjection and limitation of the Divinity, he prefers a reply in advance :-" When we see Him thus under the conditions of increase, obedience, worship, suffering, we have nothing to do but to ask what is here expressed."-P. 156. He had said before, that "the reality of Christ is what he expresses of God." A more full or distinct avowal of the Apollinarian heresy -a heresy that has been defunct for ages-could hardly be expressed in language.

3. In the third place, Dr. Bushnell "accepts" the Eutychean heresy that the human and Divine were so united in Christ as to become one nature. The doctrine of "two distinct subsistences in Christ," says he, "virtually denies any real unity between the human and the Divine, and substitutes a collocation or copartnership for unity."-P. 154. He objects to a distinction.

between the Divine and the human in the nature of Christ,

and says:

"Instead of a person whose nature is THE REAL UNITY OF THE DIVINE AND THE HUMAN, we have two distinct persons, between whom our thoughts are continually alternating; referring this to one, that to the other, and imagining, all the while, not a union of the two, in which our possible union with God is signified and sealed forever, but a practical, historical assertion rather of his incommunicableness, thrust upon our notice in a form more oppressive and chilling than it has to abstract thought. Meanwhile, the whole work of Christ, as a subject, suffering Redeemer, is thrown upon the human side of his nature, and the Divine side, standing thus aloof, incommunicably distant, has nothing in fact to do with the transaction, other than to be a spectator of it." Pp. 154, 155.

Such are the arguments of Dr. Bushnell to establish the theanthropism of the Eutycheans. But when the troublesome question comes up a question perpetually haunting and disturbing our author, as he is dodging about among these heresies, bestowing a friendly nod of recognition and of "acceptance" upon each—" who suffers, what worships," &c.? his ire rises, and he indignantly exclaims," Suspend thy raw guesses at His nature, and take His message!"

4. In the fourth place, Dr. Bushnell "accepts" the Pantheistic doctrine, that there is but one substance, intelligence, and life in the universe. This doctrine annihilates the distinction between God and the world. All creatures and all phenomena are manifestations of God. Everything that exists is a part of God; every action is God's action. This doctrine nullifies personal existence both here and hereafter; it annihilates all distinction between vice and virtue; it deifies man, but destroys God. It is removed to so little a distance from rank Atheism, that it is not worth while to carp about the difference. And yet this theological gastronomer devours the precious morceau at a single swallow. In creating worlds, he says, God "only represents, expresses, or OUTWARDLY PRODUCES HIMSELF."

Surely Dr. Bushnell is the last man in the world who should write a discourse against Dogma or creeds. Had he gone one step further, and "accepted" one other doctrine, namely, that which asserts that Christ was a mere man--he would have completely "boxed the compass" of error; and we might have hoped ere long to greet him in the ranks of sound orthodoxy. And yet we do not despair, for he not only "accepts" these several heresies, and argues for them, but he also rejects and argues against the most of them. Dr. Bushnell has strength; but in this book he appears He hits, stumto us like a giant playing at "blind man's buff.”

bles, and grasps. Without order, system, or measure, the most incongruous materials are huddled together-the most contradictory principles are placed side by side. Now we find him almost unconsciously inhaling the pure atmosphere upon the serene mountains of Christian faith-then striding across the waste desert of Rationalism-then bewildered and lost in the wilds of mysticism-anon, he comes down, floundering and besmeared, into the stagnant pool of Pantheism. Had he set himself to write a book of paradoxes, his success could not have been more complete.

No intelligent reader, however, can fail to determine the class to which Dr. Bushnell, as a theologian, belongs. In spite of the paradoxical expressions that obscure the thought, and the oft-repeated oscillations from the highest point of orthodoxy to the lowest of Rationalism and Pantheism, the Sabellian type of heresy is manifest in all the discussions upon the question of the Person and Work of Christ. This the author himself acknowledges. Referring to Schleiermacher's elaborate article upon the theory of Sabellius, translated by Professor Stuart, and published in the American Biblical Repository for July, 1835, he says:-"It will be discovered that the general view of the Trinity given in that article, coincides with the view which I have presented.” (P. 112.) Both Sabellius and Bushnell hold that the distinctions of person in the Trinity belong not to the nature of God, but originate in the circumstances under which God manifests himself. But we have not time to exhibit all the absurdities and inconsistencies into which Dr. Bushnell has fallen in his attempt to resuscitate the ashes of Sabellianism from their long and profound repose. Schleiermacher, with a more vigorous pen and a stronger intellect, essayed that task not thirty years ago. But even the Herculean might of one who had no superior among the great German theological teachers achieved little more than the erection of an additional monument to attest the vastness of his genius, the profoundness of his research, the strength of his reason, and the transparent purity of his diction. Whether Dr. Bushnell will have achieved even this, we opine will not require even thirty years to reach a historical decision. When "restored to his right mind," we predict that he will regret the publication of this volume-a volume whose influence will be evil, and evil only.

Want of space compels us to defer the discussion of the Atonement, or Work of Christ, to another number.

ART. VI.-NEANDER.

On the 19th of June last we had a delightful interview with Neander in his study at Berlin. He spoke with thankfulness of the comfortable state of his health, and was looking forward hopefully to the completion of his great work on Church History, on which, with the aid of an amanuensis, he was labouring earnestly. A few weeks after, on the Rhine, a newspaper paragraph announced to us that he was dead! The shock of that sudden announcement was not greater to us than it has proved to the religious mind of all Europe and America. Everywhere it is felt that a leader and a guide of men has fallen.

It is not possible for us at this time to give an extended review of the literary labours of Neander, nor to offer our estimate of the value of his historical and theological writings. Deferring this grateful, but laborious task, to a later period, we propose now to present a brief sketch of his life, gathered from the scanty materials that have fallen within our reach, and also to give some illustrations of his personal and professional character. For these last we shall make special use of a letter from our esteemed correspondent, Professor J. L. Jacobi, of Berlin, whose long personal intimacy with Neander gave him the fullest opportunity of insight into his characteristically frank and open nature. We shall indicate our extracts from this letter by quotation marks.

JOHANN AUGUST WILHELM NEANDER was born of Jewish parents, on the 16th of January, 1789. Of the condition of his parents, we have only learned that they were very poor. He showed early indications of that deeply devout and meditative turn of mind which was so strongly developed in his after life; and it is said that his mother, who was a very pious Jewess, took great pains to implant devotional feelings in his young heart. The Johanneum of Hamburg at that time held a very high place among the classical schools of Germany, and it was here that Neander laid the foundations of his broad classical culture-especially of his knowledge of Plato, to whose writings he devoted himself, even at that early period, with the most ardent enthusiasm. The study of Plato formed the means of his transition from Judaism to Christianity; at all events, -as he himself has shown to be the case with many of the more spiritual and genial heathen souls in the early days of the Church,-"Plato was a schoolmaster to bring him to Christ." It was, however, by the perusal of Schleier