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figns, which were the abomination of the Jews, and the harbinger of defolation.

The fame profcription extends alfo to the apocryphal book of Tobit, because it makes honourable mention of the prophecy of Jonah, which Tobit predicted was fhortly to come; and his fon Tobias, "before his death, rejoiced over the deftruction of Nineveh," xiii. 15.

"And now, my fon, depart out of Nineveh, because that those things which the Prophet Jonah fpake fhall furely come to pass,” xiii. 8.

This is an important teftimony to fhew in what high eftimation this Prophet of Galilee was held by the Primitive Jewish Church; as the powerful and inftantaneous effect of his denunciation against Nineveh, even when he had only gone through a third part of the extent of that exceedingly great city," — in the fudden repentance and humiliation of all its inhabitants, unequivocally proves that he was received among the Heathen, as a

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Prophet

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Prophet of THE MOST HIGH GOD. But, by an ominous infatuation, the Jewish Doctors, in our Lord's time, who "Searched the Scriptures," but "looked" through the mists of prejudice, determined that out of Galilee cometh no Prophet; strangely forgetting our Lord's predecessor Jonah of Gath-hepher in Galilee, 2 Kings xiv. 25.—and likewise their fucceffors the German Doctors of the prefent day ;while the prophet Daniel, held in such high eftimation by Jofephus and the Jewish nation in the days of Christ, is now equally reviled by Jewish and German Doctors.

Small reafon then have the M. R. "to confole" either themselves or the Public on the small number of books-" which after all this "fevere criticifm" [of Eichhorn] it would at most be justifiable to expel from the prefent canon,”-if two of that number be " Jonah and the Legend concerning Daniel." Vol. xxiii. N. S.

P. 497.

XII. Nor is the ftill more important canon of the New Teflament treated with

more reverence by the intemperance of hypercriticism.-Liften to the following round affertion of a " ftrenuous Unitarian" and Seceder from the Established Church—.

Evanfon: :-"That many of thofe Scriptures which form the most effential parts of the canon of the Apoftate Church, must be fabulous and falfe, feems as certain as that the WORD OF GOD is true."!!! Diffonances of the Four generally received Gafpels, p. viii.

And accordingly this calumniator lops off, without fcruple, all the Gospels but Luke's, and the principal of Paul's Epiftles, because they militate against his favourite hypothefis of the fimple humanity of JESUS CHRIST.

But how does Priestley, startled at his pupil's extravagance of scepticism, repel fuch a round and reviling charge, in his alleged Vindication of the Authenticity of the Gospel of Matthew, &c.?-He denies that they are fabulous, but he grants that they may be falfe!!!-Second Letter to a Young Man, p. 40.

-"The Evangelifts might all be very honeft men, and, in the main, well informed with respect to what they undertook to relate, and yet write their feveral narratives with all the variations that we find in them ;-(writing without any infpiration at all, and a confiderable time after the events.)- Few perfons have noted more real inconfiftencies in the different Evangelifts than myself, (as may be seen in the Differtations prefixed to my Harmony of` the Gospels.) But it never occurred to me that they furnished any objection to the authenticity of any of them."-Ibid.

Such is the curious mode of "vindica

tion" adopted by this herefiarch: - he facrifices the credibility of the Gofpels, to fave their authenticity! not leaving the latter worth defending.-The vindication furely is more ruinous than the attack:For,

Though I will not contend, like fome over-zealous and hypercritical Divines, for the plenary infpiration of every "iota and every tittle" of the Gofpels-(as, for in

ftance,

ftance, the old chronicles or genealogies quoted by Matthew and Luke, because they were merely historical records, which to fuppofe infpired compofitions would be abfurd, as defeating their original use and intention ;)—yet furely "to run into the oppofite extreme," and to affert "that the Evangelifts wrote without any infpiration at all," is most “foolish" and idle; as well as revolting to the received opinion of all but "frenuous Unitarians," of the Priestleian fect. We may indeed adopt, even from a Heathen Poet, that fage canon of criticism:

"Nec DEUS interfit, nifi dignus vindice nodus Inciderit."

"Let not Divine agency be introduced, unless a dif ficulty worthy of such interposition shall occur."

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But, furely, to fuppofe that the Evangelifts could" unfold the mystery of the Gospel"-the fublime, and in their full incomprehenfible" doctrines of the Chriftian Difpenfation, abfque afflatu divino (in the language of Cicero) — " without

extent,