We may remark, however, that there is no good reason for these two diametrically opposite tendencies. Men were not made merely for action or speculation. In following either course exclusively, they sin against the nature which God has given them. We have no cause to laugh at the airy course of the spiritual philosopher. We need not shrug our shoulders in proud self-complacency when we talk of German mysticism. We are not called upon to identify every form of nonsense, which appears among us, with the name of transcendentalism. We are not authorized to term every outbreak of error in Saxony or Switzerland with the imposing title of the newest fashion in German theology,1 We may well spare such demonstrations of our ignorance and self-conceit. On the other hand, the Germans might well copy our excellent practical habits. An infusion into the German mind of the old, sound, substantial English sense would be of inestimable worth. They ought to read Dr. Dwight's Sermons, and the works of Dr. Paley. They should become familiar with such men as Thomas Scott and Claudius Buchanan. John Newton's Letters and Cowper's poetry would do good service among the followers of Fichte and Hegel. They say that we are incapable of understanding their writings, that we scorn that which we have not mind enough to understand. With equal truth, we might affirm that they do not understand us. They have cultivated one tendency to such an extent, that they cannot see the substantial excellencies of a writer like Dr. Paley. If we have neglected the reason and the imagination, they have undervalued the sense and the practical understanding.

It is the wisdom, therefore, of both parties to adopt a more enlarged course of thinking and action. It would do our young scholars no harm to read the Dialogues of Plato-not so much for any philosophical theory which they contain, not so much for the sake of any immediate practical utility, as to become familiar with the accurate distinctions which he makes on the great questions in morals and religion that he discusses, and especially to become imbued with his noble spirit-to partake in his lofty aspirations, and to be thankful for that better light that we enjoy, but which was denied him. There is much in German literature of the highest value which we might well transfer to our language. How little we know of the great geography of Ritter? How contented are our bookmakers to go on year by year copying Malte Brun ? What do we

I See a late Letter of Dr. Malan of Geneva.

know of the profound historians Leo, Luden, Schlösser, Wachler, Ranke, Von Hammer-none of them neologists? A long list of writers in other departments we might name, but it is unnecessary.

In the preceding considerations, one reason may be discovered for the appearance of the present volume.1 The translators have cherished the hope that something might be done to break down the wall of national prejudice, and to correct an exclusive tendency which cannot but be injurious. They have wished to contribute something to aid the better feeling, which is beginning to spring up between those who speak the German and the English tongues, and to promote that brotherly intercourse which is so becoming and which may be made so useful to both parties.

There are several additional considerations, which have influenced the translators of the present volume, in thus appearing before the public. One of these is, the well known tendency, of acquaintance with foreign authors to enlarge and liberalize the mind. The man who never travelled out of his native county, is apt to be a man of prejudices. A new language is to the inward being what new eye is to the outward; one sees with it what he could not have seen without it; and by examining such developments of humanity as are not found among his own kindred, he learns to value substance more, and form less. Creatures of custom as we are, we are prone to look upon everything habitual as right of course, and everything uncommon as wrong. Unfashionable is another name for monstrous. When a blind adherence to the standard of present fashion is limited to matters of secular concern, it narrows the mind; but when it extends to theology, it cripples the very sentiments which should be most expanded. It makes men partizans, when they ought to be philanthropists. The Bible is one of the freest books ever written. Its style is as unlike that of our scholastic systems, as the costume of the oriental is unlike the pinching garb of the Englishman. It never intended that men should abridge its freeness, and press it forcibly into the mould of any human compend. We approve of

1 We may here mention that another volume is in the course of translation which will be entirely devoted to Plato and Aristotle. It will include the Life of Aristotle by Dr. A. Stahr of Halle, and a Comparison of Platonism with Christianity by Prof. Baur of Tübingen. It will also contain an estimate of the character of both these philosophers, with illustrations from the recent commentators upon their writings.

rather than to see them There is reason to fear,

creeds they are useful, needful; but there is a difference is there not-between respecting and adoring them. We prefer to see men shaping their creeds so as to suit the Bible, shaping the Bible so as to suit their creeds. that while the language of our confessions of faith is in some cases too pliant, bending to interpretations that are subversive of each other, it is in other cases too stiff and strait; giving no heed to some valuable modifications of thought, which reason approves, and allowing no place for some statements of inspiration, which always look somewhat strange alongside of the creed, and which can be disposed of the most satisfactorily by the divine who is most of a lawyer. It is to be feared, for instance, that some special pleading is required for such an explanation of Matt. 11: 21. Luke 10: 13, as will make them harmonize with the inflexible language of certain compends in reference to the doctrine of human passivity in regeneration. It is to be feared, that there is a scholastic mode of stating the doctrine of the saints' perseverance, which can be shown to be in keeping with the inspired entreaties against apostasy, by none but very ingenious and witty men. It is to be apprehended, that many, influenced more by the narrowness of a creed than the freeness of the Bible, when they repeat such passages as Heb. 6: 4—6. 10: 26 -32. 2 Pet. 2: 20-22, secretly look upon them as a kind of manœuvre, rather than as an expression of honest fear. Has not the reader himself been haunted with something like this suspicion of artifice, even when he dared not breathe it to his own conscience? and have not these passages, when invested with certain technical explanations, seemed to be in a strait-jacket, or at least not exactly at their ease?

Now in measuring our faith by the symbols of any single sect, we are often obliged to cut off some positive instructions, direct or indirect, of the Bible. Robert Hall's Preface to Antinomianism Unmasked, contains several invaluable hints on this topic. "When religious parties have been long formed," he says, "a certain technical phraseology, invented to designate more exactly the peculiarities of the respective systems, naturally grows up. What custom has sanctioned, in process of time becomes law; and the slightest deviation from the consecrated diction comes to be viewed with suspicion and alarm. Now the technical language, appropriated to the expression of the Calvinistic system in its nicer shades, however justifiable in itself,

has, by its perpetual recurrence, narrowed the vocabulary of religion, and rendered obsolete many modes of expression which the sacred writers indulge without scruple. The latitude, with which they express themselves on various subjects, has been gradually relinquished; a scrupulous and systematic cast of diction has succeeded to the manly freedom and noble negligence they were accustomed to display; and many expressions, employed without hesitation in Scripture, are rarely found, except in the direct form of quotation, in the mouth of a modern Calvinist. In addition to this, nothing is more usual than for the zealous abettors of a system, with the best intentions, to magnify the importance of its peculiar tenets by hyperbolical exaggerations, calculated to identify them with the fundamental articles of faith. Thus the Calvinistic doctrines1 have often been denominated by divines of deservedly high reputation, the doctrines of grace; implying, not merely their truth, but that they constitute the very essence and marrow of the gospel. Hence persons of little reflection have been tempted to conclude, that the zealous inculcation of these, comprehends nearly the whole system of revealed truth; or as much of it, at least, as is of vital importance; and that no danger whatever can result from giving them the greatest possible prominence. But the transition from a partial exhibition of truth to the adoption of positive error is a most natural one; and he who commences with consigning certain important doctrines to oblivion will generally end in perverting or denying them."2

Now there is a strong tendency in the members of every sect, to narrow down their views to the standard of a sectarian creed. Hence the necessity that good men of different denominations should have frequent interchange of thought and feeling. And there is a strong tendency in the inhabitants of one land to exalt certain terms, which their fathers used, into tests of orthodoxy, and to circumscribe the teachings of the Bible, within a few national shibboleths. Hence the importance of looking away from our own land, and seeing phases that truth assumes elsewhere. We shall thus find, that modes of exhibition, which we have thought essential to a sound theology, are discountenanced by sound theologians who live under

1 [The "Calvinistic doctrines" are here spoken of as distinguished from the Lutheran, or other evangelical systems.-EDS]

2 See Hall's Works, Vol. II. pp. 458-466. See also Cecil's Remains, p. 191, Andover Ed.

other skies; and that modes which we have always regarded as precursors, if not representatives of fatal error, are regarded by them as the safeguards of truth. We are alarmed at their peculiarities, and they are equally alarmed at ours. We are wondering at them, and they are amazed at our wonder. All this is a lesson to us. It teaches us, that the spirit of truth will live, when any particular body of it has died. It teaches us, that no mere modes are the articles of a standing or a falling church. It teaches us, that wise men and good men have philosophized differently, and yet have had one Lord, one faith, one baptism. We learn from it, that those two disciples of the Wittemberg reformer were more earnest in contending for the faith, than wise in determining what it was, when they began to beat each other, because one avowed himself a Martinist, while his combatant had been brought up a Lutheran. We learn from it, that if men will unite in one theology, they may be allowed to come to it through whatever by-paths of philosophy seem best to them. It is well, if we be full-grown, to see as many different faces as we can; to hear as many different voices; so we shall learn that humanity is everywhere one and the same, though its aspects are often various. Men from the northward will believe that water freezes, though the king of Siam may declare such belief heretical. As men do not look alike, nor talk alike, so they do not, in all respects, philosophize alike. They never have, and perhaps never will. So long as their temperaments vary, there will be variety in their theorizings. It is an old "dilemma" of the schoolmen, "there are two things which we ought not to fret about; what we can help, and what we can not " now we think that mere speculative, as distinct from theological differences, come under the latter "conditional," and it seems idle then to go to exscinding our brethren on account of them. A wise Christian will devote his energies to make all men unite in fundamental doctrine; and will not be afraid of the world's coming to an end, because men, who agree in faith, differ on its philosophi cal relations. We believe that some among us are troubled over much about the speculative notions of the day. It is well to be cautious-not so well to be in a fright. It is a good thing to give heed lest the spirit of our religion be circumscribed or expelled; but it is needless to raise a panic because one man prefers this mode and another that of explaining the one faith. Let not the grasshopper become a burden to us, while we are so young as a people. No