confidence that the theological faculty, through greater depth, or the greater correctness of its point of view, would be able to supply a counterpoise: if we take this also into the account, no small portion of the blame is already removed from the theologians and the Church of Germany: the evil itself remains, but it appears more as connected with the philosophical and literary spirit of the time, than as a charge against the theology, which however it may have come in contact with, and been affected by, the philosophieal endeavours of the age, has yet its own independent history; nor are the several portions of this so indistinct and confused as would appear from the notes of Mr. Rose.

And this constitutes the second point which I would notice, namely, that not only in Mr. Rose's citations, but in the sketch given in the discourses themselves, the distinction of the different times and periods has been to so great a degree neglected: an omission, which has entirely obscured the several points of transition by which theology progressively advanced towards a purer and sounder state. How can your countrymen form a correct image of our literature, when Lessing and Schelling, Steinbart and Bretschneider, Töllner and Schleiermacher, Bahrdt and Wegscheider, Herder, and the anonymous author of the Vindiciae sacra N. T. scriptur., are mentioned together, without any other distinction than the often incorrect dates? Most of these authors who are thus named together, were separated by 30 or 40 years from each other; they may to the letter say the same thing, and yet the meaning in which they say it, and the influence which it has upon the times, are by no means the same, the earlier have, perhaps, suggested as an experiment what has long since been discarded; or they have started that as philosophers, which only the more superficial writers have attempted to convert into the. ology several of them moreover had grown up in close connexion with a period in which it was a duty to contend

against a false orthoxodism which clung to the letter alone: while many of the weaker moderns have proceeded to develope their opinions into positions, against which those nobler strugglers for truth would themselves with great earnestness have contended. The neglect of these historical relations, however, (which is not made good by the description of Semler) casts a false light upon the whole view. Had our author possessed a vivid conception of the spirit of German theology, which towards the middle of the preceding century was more rigidly attached, than was ever the case in England, to a false system of doctrine, combined with a confined idea of inspiration, and a stiff intolerant method of demonstration, which impeded the healthy process of a scriptural and deeper theology; had he moreover by the study of the noblest authors of our nation in that earlier period, whether in philosophy, or in practical or elegant literature, learnt the inward desire after a noble genuine freedom of mind, for which at that time Protestant and Romanist longed, he would deem the rise of a new and partly daring direction of theology, not only a natural but an interesting phenomenon; he would have acknowledged, that in part, the legitimate requisitions of science in philology and history, led to the adoption of that new course; that many also of those so-called innovators, were well conscious that they possessed a Christian and good scriptural foundation and object, but that almost all were so deficient in firm scientific principles in the execution of these views, that too much freedom and too open a course was given to the bad, the capricious, and the irreligious, to violate the sanctuaries of the Bible, by a semi-philosophical babbling and a lawless criticism.

If then, this point of view be adhered to, that all German innovations in theology discharged themselves principally in two main channels; the one in which scientific clearness and freedom were the object of honest exertion, the other in

which an inward indisposition towards the peculiar character of the Christian Religion, moulded the yet uncompleted results of historical investigation with a shallow philosophy into an unconnected revolting commixture of naturalism and popular philosophy, all the phenomena in the history of theology will be sufficiently explained. That better race of authors, for the most part too little acquainted with the principles of the science of scriptural interpretation, and the defence of religion, committed indeed many an error, but with a chastened judgment they again struck back into the right path. It was natural that they should occasionally fail at first sight to recognise the shallowness and pervertedness of inquiries of the second scrt; and that to a certain degree participating in the fascination with which the spirit of that time had invested every species of tolerance, they should expose themselves to the injustice, by which their purer endeavours were subsequently confounded with those of the deistic naturalist ;-an injustice frequently practised in these times in a crying manner, not by Romanists only, but by Protestants of too exclusive a system of theology. And now that this better sort of temperate religiously disposed, and scientific inquirers have gained a better basis, rule, and method, partly through their own more enlarged acquaintance with the province of their science (to which belongs also the acknowledgment of its limits;) partly through the exertions of decided apologists and apologetic doctrinal writers; partly, and not least, through the endeavours of a deeper philosophy; and lastly, in part through the religious stimulus caused by momentous political events; now also that studies in ecclesiastical history, alike deep in their character and pure in their point of view, have quickened the sight for discerning the essence of Christianity; our German theology is attaining a pure and scientific character, which it could not have

acquired, so unfettered and in such full consciousness, with out first discharging itself of those baser elements.

Much is yet left to be done, much to clear away; but the more that genuine apologetic and hermeneutic principles, derived from the nature of belief and of thought, possess themselves of the mind, the more will those falsifying theories of accommodation, those wretched explanations of miracles, those presumptuous critical hypotheses, give place to a perspicuous view of the essence of Divine Revelation, to a living understanding of the prophetic and apostolic writings, and consequently to a purer exposition of the main doctrines of Christianity. You must not allow this hope to be obscured by what you may have seen of the struggles of supernaturalism, and rationalism, or perhaps may read most obnoxiously exhibited in several of our periodical works. Within the province of proper theology this contest is not so important as it often appears, and the more it developes itself the less lasting can it be; inasmuch as an independent rationalism is irreconcileable with the very idea of Christian theology, and a bare supernaturalism, which goes no further than what its name expresses, does not contain the slightest portion of the substance and doctrines of Christianity. If then it is true, that through a genuine study of scriptural interpretation and of history, a better theology has begun to find place among us, the distracting influence which this conflict exerts, must of necessity here also be gradually diminished: on the other hand it will probably continue, possibly yet more develope itself, in the more direct province of religion, in philosophy and in politics, where amid many a struggle, and many an alternation, it may systematise itself in the contrast of a relgious and of an atheistic, or of a sincere and of an hypocritical character of thought, and then again from the various points of mutual contact unavoidably re-act upon theology. This danger is, however,

no other than that to which the English Episcopal, nay even the Romanist, and indeed every part of the Christian Church, is exposed; and this disease, thus universal to mankind, may indeed delay, but cannot preclude, the restoration of German theology, derived from the genuine sources of philological and historical investigation combined with that experience in faith, which brings the mind and heart in vivid contact with them.

If, however, Mr. Rose has failed to perceive the neces sary course of developement of German theology, so neither has he become sufficiently acquainted with, nor duly appreciated, the counter workings, by which the further progress of the evil was even in the worst and most perplexed times opposed and checked. He names indeed Storr as an opponent of the rationalist school, yet so that no one could thence perceive that this theologian was only the representative of a party at all times considerable and important. He names the philosophy of Schelling, yet almost as if all the impulses in Religion and in the Church, which, for almost twenty years, have been tending to improvement and increased unity, were derived from the suspicious source of mystical philosophemata. Neither was the case. Storr was but the disciple of the whole school of Würtemburg and Tübingen, of which he was subsequently the head; a school which, without being exempt from the errors of the time, has now for between thirty and forty years united in its writings the most conscientious earnestness with the deepest investigation. Here should have be mentioned together with Storr the names and the works of the two Flatts, of Süsskind, Bengel, Steudel, &c. To the same effect notice should also have been taken of Reinhard, who, chiefly by the pure means of works alike classical and theological, promoted an improved spirit in Saxony; of Knapp, who, but lately deceased, blended the purest orthodoxy with classical attainments, which might satisfy even English scholars, and