A warm evangelical and catholic spirit pervades the whole portraiture, and it is hoped its pleasing pages may do much to re-awaken a taste in the cultivated circles of Germany for a healthier-toned reading. Mr. Sudhoff is favorably known in Germany by other publications; e. g. his " Kommunion-buch," numerous contributions to Herzog's Cyclopaedia, etc. He is a promising representative of the new liberal evangelical party.

HUPFELD ON THE PSALMS.1

WE have before us the fourth and concluding volume of the Commentary on the Psalms, edited by the venerable and honored successor of Gesenius at Halle. Before his election to the post which he has now occupied for nearly twenty years, he had acquired a very high reputation for extensive and profound learning in the Hebrew and cognate languages. His "Exercitationes Aethiopicae," published in 1825, and dedicated to his friend and patron Gesenius as "Studiorum Orientalium Primitiae, and Part I of his Hebrew Grammar, published in 1842, had attracted much attention and raised high the public expectation. His constant and pressing labors, and his unwillingness to send forth through the press any work of much pretension so long as he could be laboring to perfect it, have confined his reputation, in a great degree, to his native land. Others have read his contributions to the "Studien und Kritiken," the journal of the German Oriental Society, the "Zeitschrift," known as Müller's, and perhaps some of his monographs in University Programs, and have wished to have more of the results of his labor and learning in the interpretation of the scriptures. In the lecture-room and in private life, he has been known and honored for his high enthusiasm in his calling, and his genial Christian spirit. As a critic, he is thorough, positive, and somewhat combative. With Hengstenberg and Ewald, he is especially at variance, as the preface to his first volume abundantly shows. We hope that the purpose, which we know he has cherished, of publishing a commentary on the historical books of the Old Testament, may now be carried into execution. The present work was called out by an invitation to superintend and revise a new edition of De Wette's Commentary. To do this, and leave the work with anything of its old form, was found impossible. Another editor was found for De Wette; and we have before us the results of Professor Hupfeld's own labor.

The first impression which the work makes upon us, is that of immense labor and learning, and unexampled richness in exegetical material. The fact that the author, a man so learned and so positive in his views, had published so little, makes it impossible to avoid the discussion of many gram

1 Die Psalmen. Übersetz und ausgelecht von Dr. Hermann Hupfeld, ordent lichem Professor du Theologie zu Halle. Gotha: Perthus. 1855-62. pp. xxiii, 439; vi. 424; 482; 478.

matical and lexicographical points at considerable length. Furthermore, he is never content with stating merely his own results with their justification. He traces back each important opinion, each type of interpretation, to the earliest ascertainable authority. He cites, therefore, not merely modern commentators, but the Jewish and the earliest Christian interpreters. Calvin he holds in especial esteem. His work is thus made a storehouse of historical knowledge in its department. An exceedingly compressed and abbreviated typography enables him to bring within moderate limits an unusual amount of material.

The author has appended to his last volume the discussions which are more frequently made introductory. In pp. 419-478 he discusses title, subjects and classification, religious and moral character, Messianic relations, poetical character, rhythm, historical relations, history of the collection, superscriptions, liturgical directions, and the history of interpretation.

In relation to the other scriptures of the Old Testament, the author regards the Psalms as of peculiar interest and value, inasmuch as they present "the subjective religion of the Old Testament," while the historical and prophetical books present the objective side, "the ways of God with men." Accordingly he treats the Psalms as, without exception, composed or compiled for the expression of individual religious life, as never written with a didactic purpose, however instructive they may be, never for liturgical use, however naturally appropriated to such use in later times. The elevation of this life, in communion with God and through communications from God, gives us in some Psalms the pressage, "bold for those times," of an eternal life, long before this idea passed over into general conviction and public doctrine.

As will have been inferred from the incidental allusions made in the January number of the Bibliotheca (pp. 188, 206, 209), the author does not fully vindicate the imprecatory Psalms. His language is (IV. 432): "That such utterances, from the Christian point of view, and for us, are no longer allowed nor in the least a model for us; that we may no longer adopt them in speech and song, cannot be doubtful to the unprejudiced and clearminded Christian."

With reference to the prophetic, and more especially the Messianic Psalms, the author rejects alike the mere grammatico-historical and the allegorical interpretation, and the theory of a double sense allowing, indeed, a higher spiritual significance with the grammatical, not as distinct. from it, but coëxisting with it as "two sides of the same sense with an organic interpenetration." The prophetic or typical is therefore for the most part more or less unconscious, and "always genial, ideal, indefinitely floating over history," so that "it cannot apply to accidental external circumstances in the history of Jesus." As "poetry lives in the present, while the Messiah is an ideal of the future, there is not much that is specifically Messianic to be expected"; i. e. referring to a personal Messiah. While the general Messianic anticipations are ardent and confident, the author admits no recognition of a suffering Messiah or of a resurrection.

As would be expected from the author's stringent and consistent critical principles, he does not admit the authority of a single one of the historical superscriptions, either in respect to authorship or the occasion of the composition; nor does he find sufficient internal evidence to decide the question in any case, nor does he regard it as of the least importance to decide. In regard to the poetic form of the Psalms, the author's very extensive and thorough studies in regard to accent, rhythm, and other related matters, make him of the very highest authority.

We have perhaps sufficiently indicated Prof. Hupfeld's position, and the main characteristics of his work. However much we may be ready to assume beyond him of a New Testament and its Christianity in the Old, his Commentary we regard indispensable to those who would thoroughly study the Psalms, or indeed the Hebrew language and scriptures in general.

MEYER'S GREEK AND LATIN COMPARATIVE Grammar.1

In this volume we have another sign and result of the vigor and success with which studies in comparative philology are prosecuted in Germany. The author is one of the younger men at Göttingen. In this work he enters into the most thorough investigation of the Greek and Latin languages, partly for the sake of the better exhibition of the common characteristics and peculiarities of each, but more particularly in order to ascertain the common type, the earliest "sprachzustand" of this Greek-Latin family pair.

Two thirds of the volume before us the author devotes to an inquiry into the vocal elements of the two languages. The remainder is devoted to a discussion of roots and radical verbs. We welcome all such treatises, and believe that every year is developing in this country a taste for them and an appreciation of them. Many classical scholars will rejoice in the possession of such a work as this, who are hardly prepared to venture upon the length and breadth, the certainties and uncertainties, of the science in any more extensive form.

SCHLEICHER'S COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR.2

Other works in the same department have made the name of the author (Prof. Schleicher of Jena) familiar to philologists. We need mention only his "Sprachvergleischende Abhandlungen," of 1850, and his "Deutsche Sprache," of 1860. The introduction asks that this work may be received,

1 Vergleichende Grammatik der Griechischen und Lateinischen Sprache, von Les Meyer. Erster Band. pp. 449. Berlin: 1861.

* Compendium der vergleichenden Grammatik der Indogermanischen Sprachen von August Schleicher. Vol. I. pp, iv, 283. Weimar: 1861.

and judged simply as a compendium for beginners in the studies of this department. Experience in the lecture-room had indicated the want of a manual in the students hands to which the lecturer could refer, especially for the paradigms and full and varied examples. This work designs to supply this want, and is based upon the author's course of lectures, as delivered year by year at Jena. It takes up but two of the departments of grammar, phonology and "morphology" (as the author calls the doctrine of forms).

The volume before us contains the phonology: we have first a tabular view of the sounds in the original Indo-Germanic language; i.e. those out of which the sounds of the different Indo-Germanic languages have been developed according to phonetic laws, and to which they point back as their common source. The author then discusses in detail, first the vowels and then the consonants, first of this original language and then of the eight secondary languages or groups which constitute the family. The laws of modification are given in each case, as well as the elementary sounds. The work appears to us well designed and well executed, and we think must attract much more study to this exceedingly interesting and important department of philology.

ARTICLE VIII.

RECENT ENGLISH WORKS.

WESTCOTT'S INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF THE GOSPELS.1

Mr. Westcott has published two works of the deepest interest to the students of the New Testament; to wit, A History of the New Testament Canon during the first four Centuries, and Introduction to the Study of the Gospels. It is to this latter work, recently published by Gould & Lincoln, under the editorial care of Prof. Hackett, that we would now call the attention of our readers. It is not at all in the track of the usual introductions to the New Testament, but is quite original in its design and unique in its execution. It is subjective rather than objective, and deals with the soul rather than with the body of the gospels. It is intended to show the state of mind, the intellectual and moral atmosphere in which the gospels were produced, and to point out the historical circumstances which

1 Introduction to the Study of the Gospels; with historical and explanatory Notes. By Brooks Foss Westcott, A.M., formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, etc., etc. The American edition of this work is published by Gould & Lincoln, Boston; with an Introduction by Horatio B. Hackett, D D., Professor in Newton Theological Institution. 12mo., pp. 476.

led to the peculiar religious ideas in which the writings of the New Testament had their origin. He begins with an elaborate and yet very plain and common-sense discussion of the inspiration, the completeness, and the interpretation of Holy scripture. He then comes to the preparation for the gospel as shown in the moral developments of the, Oriental, Greek, and Jewish literature in the generations preceding the advent of Christ. Then he has a full development of the Jewish doctrine, both ancient and modern, of the Messiah. This is followed by a very able discussion of the origin of the gospels as we now have them in the New Testament, a discriminating characterizing of the three synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and of the relation of the Gospel of John to its three predecessors. He then has a very fair examination of the differences in detail or discrepancies of the synoptic gospels, and a careful solution of the difficulties in the gospels. In the Appendix several important topics are taken up which could not so well come into the body of the work. Among these are a history of the primitive doctrine of inspiration, an account of the traditionary notices of our Lord's words and works, a review of some of the more important apocryphal gospels, and other topics of a like kind.

The reader will see at once the importance and interest of all these subjects, especially at the present time, and in view of recent discussions; and we can assure him that they are all treated in the spirit of a ripe and genuine scholarship, and the reverential and loving tone of a pure Christianity.

Prof. Hackett has enhanced the value of the American edition by giving to it a well-written Introduction, and adding a few brief notes, such as we might expect from a Christian scholar like him.

At this day, when there is so much of scepticism as to the authority and the authenticity of scripture, when reviews and essays have emanated from the bosom of the English church itself, of a character that we should scarcely have expected from the native land of rationalism, a work like this is greatly needed; and it ought to be in the hands of every intelligent believer.

PROF. MAURICE ON THE APOCALYPSE.1

If we may borrow a phrase from French politics, and designate the Commentary on the Apocalypse by Mr. Eliot as the extreme right of interpretation, this one by Prof. Maurice might well be called the extreme left, while Dr. Wordsworth and Dean Alford would be respectively on the right and left centre. There is nothing more encouraging in the whole de partment of sacred interpretation, than the manner in which the ablest minds are taking hold of this mysterious but delightful and most useful

'Lectures on the Apocalypse; or, Book of Revelation of St. John the Divine. By F. D. Maurice, M.A., Incumbent St. Peters, Vere Street. Cambridge: Macmillan & Co. 1861.