Again, p. 131. THE substantial agreement of four witnesses is a much more powerful evidence of the truth of their testimony than their relating the same events in precisely the same order, with exactly the same circumstances, and in the same identical phrases. The latter supposition would almost necessarily involve the sus picion of contrivance, and, consequently, of imposture, while the former betrays no effort beyond that of faithfully narrating what has occurred, and thus, in the judgment of all unprejudiced persons, secures the conviction of its veracity. Such, then, is the testimony of the four Evangelists; whose qualifications to write the sacred history were of the highest order, and whose character, after enduring the test of the severest investigation, continues unimpeached. When they are brought into juxta-position, it is admirable to observe how little they are indebted to the skill and penetration of others to harmonize their statements. That which is principally required is, an ingenuousness in interpreting their narrations, similar to that which so obviously characterizes the whole of their records; this, involving of course such "In every discourse the attentive hearer should be able to perceive the way of salvation, and to understand that the doctrine of the cross is the only hope of men. Should it be thought that the constant introduction of this topic infringes upon the beauty, the order, or the excellency of a discourse, let it be known that this itself is beauty, order, and excellency. If any should think that it disturbs the rules of composition, let them know that no rules can be so sacred as to justify its exclusion from a service intended to instruct men in the way to eternal life. A sermon without Christ is like a statue without life, or a picture of a man instead of the man himself. As there is not a village in the kingdom but from which there is a road, either direct or indirect to its metropolis, so there is no text in the scripture in preaching from which a zealous warm-hearted minister will not find a way to Christ. If the captives in Babylon could say, 'If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning; if I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I do not prefer Jerusalem above my chief joy;" surely a Christian minister when preaching to perishing sinners, should never forget Christ, and redemption through his blood. Is he not infinitely more both to him, and to his congregation, than that city could be to them? What would the apostle Paul have said, had he heard a man professing to be a minister of the gospel address a number of sinful mortals without so much as once mentioning the glorious doctrine of the cross? He would have preached himself immediately after the conclusion, and before they had left the place would have told them of the Saviour and his death, as the only way of pardon and peace for guilty men. What will Christ himself say to preachers who are so afraid lest they should break certain rules of composition as to exclude him from their sermons? When he sent out his apostles, it was "By placing the narrations of similar cirto preach the gospel-good news-glad tidings cumstances, as related by the several Evange-the love, the grace, the mercy, and the good-lists, in opposite columns, their deviations or ness of God, displayed in the salvation of men through his own death. A minister who can frequently preach without adverting to this subject, should examine his own heart, and try and prove his own state, lest in the end the evil spirit leap upon him, and drive him out of his office naked and wounded." an attention to circumstances as the nature of the case requires, leaves little to be desired but that the mind and heart receive that inde lible impression which they are designed and adapted to impart. Every help, however, to a correct understanding of this inestimable section of the inspired volume must be cordially welcomed by the biblical student, on which account we would recommend to his perusal this "English Harmony;" from which, with its explanatory notes and judicious indexes, he cannot fail to obtain considerable assistance in the prosecution of his important inquiries. The following quotation from the preface will suggest to our readers an idea both of the arrangement and of the utility of this interesting work additions are more readily observed, and more easily compared. Thus arranged, obscure passages are frequently illustrated by the sugges tion of a seemingly indifferent circumstance, and the deficiencies of one Evangelist are supplied by the more ample detail of another; by which means a full and connected history of our Saviour is formed, and the distinct phraseology and idiom of these sacred writers are more conspicuously displayed." WORKS RECENTLY PUBLISHED. Biographical History of the Christian Church; from the Commencement of the Christian Era to the time of Wickliffe, the Reformer. By J. W. Morris. 2 vols. 8vo, 16s. The Burial and Resurrection of Jesus Christ; according to the Four Evangelists. From the German of John Davis Michaelis: formerly Professor of Philosophy at Gotttingen, Privy Counsellor of Justice, Knight of the Polar Star, Member of the Royal Society at London, and of the Academy of Inscriptions of Paris, &c. &c. 12mo. 6s. 6d. bds. The Large Family; an Allegory, intended to illustrate some of the leading Doctrines, Duties, and Advantages of Religion, in an easy and familiar manner, adapted especially to Youth. By J. W. Bristol. 18mo. 4d. Memoirs of a West Indian Planter. Published from an Original Manuscript, with a Preface and additional Details. By the Rev. John Riland, M. A. Curate of Yoxall, Staffordshire. 12mo. 5s. Lectures on the Psalms. By the late Rev. John Ewart, A. M. 3 vols. 8vo. 11. 11s. 6d. An Antidote to a spreading Antinomian Delusion, by the late Rev. John Brine, a new edition. A Funeral Sermon occasioned by the Death of Miss Elizabeth C. By the Rev. 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The History of Scotland, translated from the Latin of George Buchanan; with a continuation to the present time. By John Watkins, LL.D. with Portraits and other Plates, boards, South Sea and Sandwich Islands, against the charge and misrepresentations of the Quarterly Review, in a Letter addressed to the Editor of that Journal. Rev. Dr. Pye Smith has in the press a new Edition, very much enlarged, of his Discourse on the Sacrifice, Priesthood, and Atonement of Christ.-Twelve Instructive and Familiar Lectures to Young Persons on the Intellectual and Moral Powers of Man; the Existence, Character, and Government of God; the Evidences of Christianity, &c.; with a Concluding Address on Nonconformity, delivered at Northampton. By the late Rev. John Horsey-Elements of Mental and Moral Science, in one volume, 8vo. about 520 pages. By George Payne, A.M., Resident and Theological Tutor of the Blackburn Independent Academy. This volume will include most of the subjects which are discussed in more voluminous works, exhibit, on all the main topics, the opinions which have been held by our most Narrative of a Mission to Nova Scotia, New celebrated writers, show the bearing of many Brunswick, and the Somers Islands; with a of the subjects, upon several branches of TheTour to Lake Ontario, and Travels in the In-ological science, and endeavour to bring Theoterior of America; in a Series of Letters, ad-logy and Mental Philosophy into a closer state dressed to James Montgomery, Esq. of Sheffield. By Joshua Marsden, late Wesleyan Missionary. With a Portrait of the Author, by J. Jackson, Esq. R.A. and a Mission-Scene, by White. In one thick volume, 12mo. 2d edition, boards, 58. 15s. Now publishing, in numbers, an interesting work, entitled, "The Manners and Customs of all Nations," by the Rev. J. Platts. The Rev. Thomas Sims has nearly ready for publication, an Apology for the Waldenses; exhibiting an historical view of their origin, orthodoxy, loyalty, and constancy. With an Appeal to several European governments on their behalf. In 8vo. of union than that in which they have generally existed.-The friends of the late Rev. David Bogue, D.D., are respectfully informed, that the Memoirs of his Life, by the Rev. James Bennett, are nearly ready for publication. A second Series of the Bible Story Book, by the Rev. B. H. Draper, is in the press. The third Edition of the First Series is just published.-A fourth Edition of Christian Father's Present to his Children, by the Rev. J. A. James, is in the press. We are informed that "The Amulet" for the year 1827-8, will be published on the first of No Preparing for publication, a History of Eng-vember, on a scale of greater excellence than land, from the earliest period to the present time, in which it is intended to consider men and events on Christian principles. By a clergyman of the Church of England. To appear in monthly numbers, and to be completed in 4 volumes 12mo. The second part of the Rev. S. T. Bloomfield's Recensio Synoptica Annotationes Sacræ ; or, Critical Digest of the most important Annotations on the New Testament. In 4 vols. 8vo. Messrs. Parbury, Allen and Co. have nearly ready for publication a Memoir relative to the either of its predecessors.-Second Edition of the Parent's Monitor, or Narratives, Anecdotes, and Observations on Religious Education and Personal Piety, by the Rev. David Barker, 12mo.-Proposals for publishing by subscription a new and uniform edition of the Works of the English and Scottish Reformers. Edited by Thomas Russel, M.A. The works of the principal Reformers, Cranmer, Latimer, Hooper, and Ridley, will be printed entire, and selections will be made from their contemporaries. They will be accompanied with biographical sketches. It is expected the collection will make about sixteen volumes. RELIGIOUS MAGAZINE, on SPIRIT OF THE FOREIGN THEOLOGICAL JOURNALS AND REVIEWS. FEBRUARY, 1828. From the Congregational Magazine. MEMOIRS, INCLUDING LETTERS AND less estimated by years than by deeds and acquisitions, and if none have lived in vain who have lived to God, then the poignancy of our SELECT REMAINS, OF JOHN URQU-regrets may be softened, and our sense of loss HART, late of the University of St. Andrew's. mitigated. The premature fall of one man has By Wm. Orme. 2 vols. 12mo. 10s. Holdsbeen more useful than the long life of another. worth. God has granted some of his servants more success after they were dead than while they lived; and made their graves more eloquent than their tongues. The good we design, and the promise we give in life, may yet be fulfilled, when we live only in the memories and regrets of mankind. Our very dust, at God's bidding, shall put forth a virtue, which living we could not command, and the bones of a dead prophet produce effects surpassing all that accompanied his life. Great, as we might fairly calculate, would have been the usefulness of a Spencer, and a Kirk White, and a Martyn, had their age been lengthened only to the ordinary lot of man, yet there is satisfactory evidence, in the excitement their deaths occasioned, in the impulse their characters gave-an impulse not yet subsidedand in the fragrancy of grace which their memorics still diffuse, that the promise of their youth has not failed-they still bloom, still preach, still write. An honour has been accorded them not granted to many of our race, of having their youth immortalized, and all their fair colours and brightest hues perpetuated in the dewy freshness of the morning, before age had dimmed their lustre; just as we have seen flowers and fruits enshrined with all their loveliest tints in a bed of amber. And now another name must be added, and Urquhart be entwined with this flowery wreath of Zion's choicest blos THE sensibilities of nature, as well as the benignant anticipations of grace, constrain us to drop the tear of unfeigned sorrow over the tomb of early and consecrated genius. The sight of the scathed sapling, or withered rosebud awakens a displacent sympathy. But when a whole harvest is ravished from us by blasting mildew, just when the ear was bursting from its hood-it is not a bare frustration, it is a mockery of hope, that sharpens regret, and augments the sense of desolation. Yet such visitations are ordained to come upon an apostate race, to subserve the high purposes of a retributive and corrective dispensation. We are apt to call these displays of divine sovereignty mysterious, while their obvious tendency is not merely to impress the lesson of the universal reign of sin and death, but to teach the renovated part of human intelligences, that the God of grace is independent of the selectest agency, and that what he condescends to use, be it illustrious or mean, owes its efficiency to his own blessing. If the sympathies of nature seem to be all violated when youthful bloom and vigour are given as a prey to the destroyer, how much sharper does the pang become where there had been promise of eminent talent and rare endowment! Add still to the bitterness of the visitation-the disappointment of benevolent desires, the frustration of gracious hopes, the sudden extinction of a burning In performing our duty, which we can hardly and a shining light in a benighted world-and persuade ourselves ought to be that of critics, we the sadness both of natural feeling and of gra- are too much wrapt in admiration of the extracious sympathy, can rise no higher. Genius ordinary youth, to allow any feelings to predo-the rarest of human endowments, and piety minate but those of regret, for so much excel-the choicest of divine benedictions, fading lence torn from us before we knew that we poslike a nipt blossom or an unripe fruit, and drop-sessed it; and of ardent hope that the burning ping into the portion of weeds and withered leaves; this is a stroke that rankles, while it pierces to the holiest sanctuary both of natural and devout sensibility. Science and Religion both deck themselves in weeds, and bend over such a tomb. The loss is not private; the stroke and the pang are not personal; it is the world that has lost a benefactor; the church that is bereft of an ornament. Yet if it be true, that human life should be soms. love, and matured piety, and manly wisdom of young Urquhart may yet display a seminating virtue, and rise again multiplied a hundred fold from his ashes, through the memorial by which those high qualities will now come in contact with more minds, than they could ever have influenced while living. John Urquhart was a young man of only eighteen at his death, who had made a inost dis tinguished figure in every department of learnN ing, and far outstripped all his compeers; and of them it may be said, the fame of Dr. Chalmers had drawn some of the choicest youths of the North, and several from the South, to the University of St. Andrew's, at the time that young Urquhart made his appearance. It is not necessary for us to follow the narrative of his rapid and brilliant transit. We shall first give our readers the opportunity of perusing the brief but expressive outline of his character from the pen of Dr. Chalmers, which is contained in the preface to the memoir. It is addressed in a letter to Mr. Orme. "He is altogether worthy of the biographical notice which you purpose. My first knowledge of him was as a student, in which capacity he far outpeered all his fellows; and in a class of uncommon force, and brilliancy of talent, shone forth as a star of the first magnitude. "I do not recollect the subjects of his various Essays; but the very first which he read in the hearing of myself, and of his fellow-students, placed him at the head of the class in point of estimation: a station which he supported throughout, and which was fully authenticated at the last, by the highest prize being assigned to him for those anonymous composi tions, which are submitted to my own judgment, and among which, I decide the relative and respective merits, without any knowledge of their authors. "For several months I only recognised him as a person of fine taste, and lofty intellect; which, teeming forth, as they did from one who had not yet terminated his boyhood, gave the indication, and the promise of something quite superlative in future life. It was not till after I had, for a time, admired his capacities for science, that I knew him as the object of a far higher admiration, for his deep and devoted sacred ness. "It was in the second session of my acquaintance with him, that I devolved upon him the care of a Sabbath-school, which I had formed. In the conduct of this little seminary, he displayed a tact, and a talent, which were quite admirable, and I felt myself far out-run by him, in the power of kind and impressive communication; and in that faculty, by which he commanded the interest of the pupils, and could gain, at all times, the entire sympathy of their understanding. Indeed, all his endowments, whether of the head or of the heart, were in the best possible keeping. For example, he was alike literary and mathematical, and combined the utmost beauty of composition, with the rigour and precision of the exact sciences. But his crowning excellence was his piety; that virtue, which matured him so early for heaven, and bore him in triumph from that earth on which he hath so briefly sojourned. This religious spirit gave a certain etherial hue to all his college exhibitions. He had the amplitude of genius, but none of its irregularities. There was no shooting forth of mind, in one direction, so as to give a prominency to certain acquisitions, by which to overshadow, or to leave behind, the other acquisitions of his educational course. He was neither a mere geometer, nor a mere linguist, nor a mere metaphysician; he was all put together; alike distinguished by the fulness, and the harmony of his powers. "I leave to you, Sir, the narrative of his higher characteristics. I have spoken, and fully spoken, of the attainments of his philosophy,to you it belongs, to speak of the sublimer attainments of his faith. "Had I needed aught to reconcile me to the transition which I have made, from the state of a pastor, to that of a professor, it would justly be the successive presentation, year after year, of such students as John Urquhart, nor, in giving up the direct work of a Christian minister, can I regret the station to which Providence has translated me, at one of the fountain heads of the Christian ministry in our land.”—pp. xvi— XX. Mr. Orme was his friend and pastor, Dr. Chalmers was one of his tutors at the University, and it may be deemned probable, that the one has been swayed by personal friendship, and the other by an innocent kind of favouritism not unusual in teachers who entertain a lively interest in the improvement and eminence of their pupils. But so far as our judgment extends, though there should be a little over-estimating in some branches of his character, which we by no means profess to have detected, yet there is none in the total amount: and we are convinced that, after all, some of his great excellences, and those the most astonishing in a lad of his age, considerably surpass all that his biographer and his literary friends have stated. It is abundantly evident, from the specimens contained in these interesting volumes, that however splendid were his literary acquirements, his gracious endowments were still more So. He might have found elsewhere many compeers in every department of science and letters, in which, at St. Andrew's at least, he stood without a rival; but we very much doubt if there existed his equal among the churches of Great Britain, either in theological science or practical piety; and certainly, for the extraordinary assemblage of genius, learning, theology, and holy zeal, it may be long before we shall hear of such another. His college career was short, but from the very first, splendid in a high degree. He entered the University by gaining the first bursary, or exhibition, from thirty-three competitors, in the year 1822. In every subsequent session he outstripped, by a lengthening distance, all his fellows; and successively attained the highest distinction in every stage of his curriculum. But Mr. Orme has wisely forborne to enter into details of his literary and scientific eminence-he had a higher object in view than to hold forth his young friend, as a favourite son of genius, or a rising light of science. The youthful Urquhart had felt the promptings of a nobler ambition; he had consecrated all to the service of his Saviour; and his short, yet happy career of spiritual usefulness was begun at St. Andrew's. There the Missionary standard was erected, and this youthful leader, who stood unrivalled amidst the venerable Halls of that ancient University, and bore off its highest honours, was not ashamed to stand at its gate and cry, "Who is on the Lord's side? let him come unto me." A band of choice young spirits caught the flame; and there did he assemble them, from time to time, to fire their breasts with a purer ardour than that which urged them up the hill of science. He had, with some others of his youthful associates, resolutely devoted himself to the Missionary work; was endeavouring to spread the holy leaven; concerting measures for uniting the pious youth in all the Universities of Scotland, England, and America, in one Missionary Association, and was labouring to induce affectionate and reluctant relatives to resign him for ever to the Lord's work among the heathen, when, like a too early flower, that had untimely discovered its beauty, he faded, and sunk almost without warning, before the astonished and admiring gaze of his friends. There is, if not a melancholy, (for we would not seem to use a murmuring word in reference to his fall,) yet a plaintive satisfaction now in the perusal of those remains which particularly exhibit his attainments in divine knowledge and personal religion. Mr. Orme has dedicated his work to the London Missionary Society, who were to have had the living youth, as soon as his affairs and the feelings of his relatives, and his age, would have justified them in accepting his services. They have his memory; they have the picture of a missionary student, such an one as may yet do them and their cause much more essential service than could have been rendered by his personal labours, had they been extended to hoary hairs. We shall now present our readers with one or two specimens of his religious attainments. These, in the style and grace of their execution, will enable every qualified person to judge of the general superiority of his faculties, as well as show, in its results, the amount of his various attainments. The first is only a fragment, and is entitled "ON THE LOVE of fame. “And seekest thou great things for thyself?"&c. Jeremiah. "I have often thought it peculiarly interesting to compare that morality which is to be found in the systems of ancient philosophy, with the morality which is contained in the Bible ;-to see the heart of man still reflecting, though dimly and imperfectly, that image which was stamped upon it at first;-to observe the harmonious accordance which obtains between the law that is written in the heart, and the law which has been revealed to us by the Spirit of God,-and thus to identify that God who hath formed the heart of man, with that God, who, in times past, spake unto the fathers by the prophets; and who hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son. "Some of these theories of the ancients are so beautiful, and so perfect, that we are apt to feel disappointed that their practical influence was not extensively and powerfully felt. But we shall not wonder at this, if we consider how difficult it is to arrest the attention by abstract truths; and how little of practical efficacy there is in such truths, even when most fully apprehended. To cultivate any feeling, we must not look to the feeling itself; but to the object which naturally excites it. And in this point of view we may behold the vast superiority of the Christian religion, to every other, as a system of practical morality. "Here the abstract principles of natural religion are embodied in facts: and all that we have to do is to direct the attention to these facts, and the proper state of feeling is the invariable and immediate result. "But not only are the systems of the ancient philosophers deficient in practical efficacy; they are even imperfect as theories of morality. Pure and elevated as they appear, when viewed abstractly and in themselves, they cannot stand a comparison with that purer system which has been given us by revelation. "To most of the precepts which are given us in the Bible, we can find some counterpart in the writings of heathen philosophers; but there is one virtue which wo hesitate not to say, is more frequently inculcated in the Bible than any other;-for a counterpart to which you may search the whole writings of ancient philosophy, and find nothing that bears to it the most distant resemblance. Never did there come from the pen of a heathen, sentiments like those contained in our motto -"Seekest thou great things for thyself? Seck them not." It is a very striking fact, that, in the language of Greece and Rome, there is not a word to express humility as a virtue:-those words which are generally used signify rather meanness and that crouching to power, which is the feeling not of a humble, but of a dastardly spirit. On the other hand, pride and haughtiness were considered as the concomitants of prowess and bravery; and hence the heroes of ancient poetry are generally furnished with an abundant portion of both. "Yes: that vice which we inherit from the author of our misery, lurks, too successfully in the recess of the human bosom, to be discovered by the light of reason alone;-it requires a more searching scrutiny to drag it from that place, while it has taken up its abode in the inmost penetralia of our souls. In the present depraved state of the human heart, it is difficult to distinguish between those desires and propensities which may have once been pure, but which, at the fall, were perverted; and those which are radically evil, and which could not have existed in the heart of man, in his state of original purity. Without hesitation, we would class pride in the latter division, as a feeling altogether of demoniacal origin; and which could not exist in the mind of a pure and holy being. "But though we can thus give a most unhesitating deliverance with regard to this vice itself, there are some of its modifications about which we cannot denounce so decidedly. The desire of fame, and the desire of power, and all that is described in our text by the seeking after great things, have so often been declared by our theological writers to be innocent, if not laudable propensities, that we almost feel as if it were presumption for us to give it as our opinion, that they are inimical to the spirit of true religion. "It may be true, that such feelings existed in the bosom of our first parents, before their expulsion from the blissful abodes of Eden; and that they vied with each other to gain the favour and applause perhaps of their God. And it may be true, that there is among the angels a generous emulation, to provoke each other to good works;-but still we think it true, that in our present condition, it is extremely dan |