chism, and sing the poems; they all write let- and a very forcible address to the reader. The visit to decide the matter. The second class From the Home Missionary Magazine. SATURDAY EVENING. That ushers placid evening in, The Sabbath's peaceful hours begin: Hush'd is the tumult of the day, And worldly cares and business cease, To hymn the glad return of peace! Oft as this peaceful hour shall come, Lord, raise my thoughts from earthly things, On faith and hope's celestial wings,- : 504 Scripture Natural History.-Love to Jesus. THE blooming annuals, which of late years The volumes now before us may be considered as belonging to the class we have just described; and it cannot be denied, that they stand on an elevated ground as candidates for fame. So far as mere embellishment can claim any title to respect, they have nothing to apprehend from the most rigorous investigation. The binding is neat and elegant, without any needless decorations. The paper is of a superior quality. The type is clear, and the page on which it is impressed exhibits an inviting aspect. In the graphic department, the two volumes contain eighty-two copperplate engravings, the whole of which are executed with a more than ordinary degree of neatness, and at times display a portion of elegance, which, from their vast number, we were not prepared to expect. These plates exhibit the various beasts, birds, reptiles, insects, trees, plants, and shrubs, that are mentioned in scripture, and occasionally introduce to our notice representations of the same species, taken from discoveries in more modern days. In In some of the copies, we apprehend, these plates are coloured, but not having seen any of this description, we can say nothing of their superior excellence. In connexion with these plates, the places of scripture in which the subjects they represent occur, are either pointed out or quoted at large, and these are followed by the natural history of the creature or its species. The history thus given is derived from various sources, and frequently enlivened with anecdotes, and incidents which the occasion furnishes; but the description is never lengthened into tedious detail. Mrs. Hewlett seems to have acquired the art of terminating her historical delineations before the interest which it excited has forsaken her page. By following this plan, she transfers the source of attraction from one subject to another, and thus, by imperceptible degrees, holds the youthful reader in pleasing captivity, until she has conducted him through her volumes. In the history of each animal or species, the manner and reason of its being mentioned in scripture is constantly kept in view, and not unfrequently we discover, that all allusions to the creatures are rendered strikingly appropriate, by the peculiarities of their varied charac ter. With these branches of natural history, Mrs. Hewlett seizes every opportunity to interweave some moral or religious truth, which, instead of elevating the flag of local distinction, has a direct application, to the heart and life. They also, at times afford room for important inferences and reflections, which the fair authoress well knows how to introduce. In all these respects, the numerous articles composing these volumes may be considered as an illustrative commentary on the subjects to which they respectively refer; and that reader, who makes himself acquainted with their uniform adaptations to inform his mind, will have also learnt, that the sacred writings furnish a source of rational amusement, as well as of authoritative doctrines and preceptive ethics. It is, perhaps, scarcely needful to observe, that while the names of the numerous tribes, both represented and characterized in these volumes, are mentioned in scripture, the materials of which this history is composed must be sought and found in other sources. This has led Mrs. Hewlett to consult the writings of voyagers and travellers, not merely of ancient, but also of modern days; and from their concurring testimony, as an authentic source of information, she has furnished out the gratifying repast, with which the youthful reader is to be regaled. At the close of the second volume, a list of the plates is given, and reference is made to the page where each shall be finally introduced, that the engraving and the description may appear together. may appear together. Detached from the embellishments, we have perused many of the articles with peculiar pleasure;. but this is considerably augmented, by connecting them with the characteristic plates by which they are illustrated. Congratulating Mrs. Hewlett, therefore, on having produced a work so admirably calculated to make an impression on the juvenile mind, that promises to be as useful as it will be durable, we cannot hesitate strongly to recommend these volumes to the attention of our readers. From the Congregational Magazine. LOVE TO JESUS. REFLECTING on the crown of thorns, I wonder at that love divine, And while I wonder, I adore; Which feels such mighty love no more. Strange no vibrating chord is found, Man's cold and torpid breast within, But soon the chains of flesh will fall, The spirit burst its cell, and soar, RELIGIOUS MAGAZINE, OR SPIRIT OF THE FOREIGN THEOLOGICAL JOURNALS AND REVIEWS From the Eclectic Review. MAY, 1830. THE author of these volumes is advantageously known by several publications; his Travels in France and Italy, his Letters maintaining the occasional, though rare lawfulness of War, and pre-eminently, his "Thoughts" preparatory and subsidiary to Private Devotion, which contains the remarkable correspondence with Lord Byron. The character of Mr. Sheppard's mind seems to be vigilant, sagacious, and scrutinizing, ingenuous and candid to the veriest scrupulosity, and withal delicate, cautious, and apprehensive to a degree far beyond what is necessary. His conclusions, therefore, are often less strongly stated than his premises require; he is scarcely equitable to himself, and he shrinks with undue timidity from his just claims on the confidence and gratitude of his readers. Yet this cast of mind has its advantages. Though it must be often distressing to its possessor, it is advantageous to those who partake of its results. Though it awakens some pain in sympathizing with its hesitations, and something like vexation at the apologetic strain into which it is prone to run, yet, it is a strong auxiliary in matters of argument; it is an assurance for fidelity; it is a guarantee against over-statement; it produces an anticipation of objection, and a fair dealing with difficulty, which, to a conscientious reader, will be always gratifying. Mr. Sheppard needed not to be disquieted by the apprehension, that a new book on the Evidences of Revealed Religion would appear superfluous; when his materials, though necessarily not new in themselves, must be so to the large majority of English readers; when the mode of disposing those materials and arguing from them, is distinctly his own; and when the attacks of infidelity are renewed every day, with an effrontery of which no honest man is capable, and in every variety of form, from the way-laying sneer of polished literature, to the shameless grin of vulgar falsehood and the coarsest imposture. Numerous as are the treatises on the proofs and authoRel. Mag.—Vol. IV. rity of religion, we are not unfrequently at a loss to find such as are specifically adapted to particular classes whom we wish to engage in the study, or whose inquiries we desire to satisfy. For instance, there are numerous persons, in both younger and maturer life, who have received an education respectable, or even solid and extensive, who have read much on other subjects, perhaps in the insidious pages of Voltaire, or Hume, or Gibbon, and who are not averse from thinking; but who, very blameably to themselves or their early instructors, have been left miserably ignorant of the most sublime and the best proved of all truths. In their hearts, extreme doubts often lodge, and are secretly nourished: but, as they have not totally silenced the voice of reason and conscience, they have a portion of candour still remaining; and they can be persuaded to give some degree of a patient hearing to the subject of infinite interest, but upon which they are, in truth, deplorably uninformed. To persons of this description, the work before us is well adapted. Scarcely less important would be its utility to those who feel no difficulties pressing upon their faith, and who imagine that their mountain stands too strongly to be ever moved. If they neglect to get their minds stored with sound information upon this class of topics, a time may too probably come, when they will bitterly rue their present supine security. Even to the best informed and inost established Christian, it is delightful to walk round the ramparts of the sacred city, and, at every examination, to make new discoveries upon the extent and cohesion of the eternal rock on which it rests. These volumes comprise a great number of Disquisitions, Historical, Literary, and Philosophical, each, in a sense, independent of the others, and bearing a satisfactory conclusion to a mind which is at all accustomed to the weighing of moral evidence; and yet all so grouped and mutually bound together, that the accumulation of proof becomes all but irresistible. The general plan may be conceived of, though, by no means completely, by the two Propositions which lead to the divisions of the whole work. "I. Before studying either the miraculous or the prophetic proof of Christianity, or the written accounts of its progress, whether by friends or enemies, there may be enough No. 29.-2 U known from a view of its distinctive character, | advantages of the first Christian teachers; of its actual effects, of its continued and prospective spirit and tendency, and of its acknowledged commencement, to yield a complex presumption that it is "not of men, but of God." "II. There are statements concerning Christianity and other coeval religions, in extant Jewish and heathen writers; in citations from lost works of its adversaries, in notices of current oral objections to it; in public appeals as to public facts by early Christian apologists; in details by Christian writers of events, the general truth of which is amply confirmed by their opponents; together with implications in the silence of some Jews and heathens, and in the conduct of others; which concur to furnish very strong additional grounds for believing its supernatural origin."—Introd. p. xxiv. their being of the nation despised above all others, their low condition, the want of philosophic dignity and rhetorical attractions, and the immense difficulties attendant upon any attempt of foreigners to instruct on subjects surrounded with nicety and prejudice, either the lettered or the vulgar part of a nation." From this theoretical estimate of the project and the obstructions, or rather insuperable difficulties, even palpable impossibilities, which must have surrounded it, Mr. Sheppard proceeds to the collecting and analyzing of known facts. The nature, modes, and degree of the actual opposition made by the Jews, both in Palestine and in other countries, both native and proselytic. The correspondent historical statements with regard to the heathen governments and all ranks of the people. Opposition from acts of the State,—direct, in persecutions, early, never totally ceasing for 250 years, extending through the empire, penetrating into all the classes of society, and diversified, in forms next to incredible of remorseless cruelty;-indirect, in acts of the savage populace, connived at and often encouraged by the agents of government. Oppositions in the way of calumny, reproach, ridicule; all the modes of private annoyance, public hatred, and ever-pressing seduction. These facts and correlates, the author traces through their multitude of labyrinths, examining, sifting, comparing, with a minuteness and completeness which are evidently dictated by a mind solicitously upright and impartial. The materials and the critical investigations which spring out of them, are brought together in Notes, Supplements, and Appendices, located throughout the volumes according to their relative proximity to the lines of reasoning which form the general body and texture of the work. The composition must have cost Having arrived at this point, and confirmed the author extreme labour in research, as well and illustrated the vast multitude of facts by as much patient reflection. Of so comprehen- abundant authorities, Mr. Sheppard goes on to sive a work, we cannot undertake to give what show, that the religion of Jesus Christ, in the might serve as a complete outline; but we face of all the proved circumstances of resistshall attempt such a sketch, as much as possi-ance, did make a progress rapid and extensive, ble in the author's own words, as shall present to an intelligent mind enough to produce a correct general idea of the whole. "Christianity differs in principle from all religions that men have fabricated, and from any that we suppose they would fabricate. It differs specifically from all other religions, in its ascertained effects,-notwithstanding declensions and aberrations,-and in its continued tendency to purify itself from corruption, to regain vitality, and to diffuse itself by pacific and benevolent means. The acknowledged meanness of its commencement augments its extraordinary and wonderful character, and enhances the incredibility of its being a human device. "The circumstances of Jesus and his first adherents, as collected from the statements, implications, and admissions of enemies to Christianity; the personal character of Jesus; -the singular morality of the primitive Christians; many remarkable testimonies from adversaries upon these points;—the nature, degree, and manner of the opposition which it was to be rationally calculated that Christianity would have to encounter from the Jews; the same inquiry pursued with respect to the Romans and other heathen nations;-the morality of heathenism-not only its general licentiousness, but its subtle, versatile, and optional character, by which it could be made to satisfy the consciences of such men as Scipio and Cicero, Trajan and Aurelius Antoninus, while yet the foundation of moral principle was but the more effectually sapped by the very pretence of goodness; the peculiar dis so as to effect a phenomenon the most wonderful and absolutely unique. "We have seen, from the testimony of Jews and heathens, that this doctrine, alike unacceptable to each and resisted by both, had, from the very period of its Founder's death, sustained and spread itself in his native land; that, within fifty years, it had prevailed over heathenism in some large territories of Asia; and that, within a century, it was widely dif fused through the known world, and chiefly through the most lettered and civilized portions of the Roman Empire. "Yet, this Summary of the facts and arguments is much less impressive than the examination of them separately and in detail; for we cannot do justice, in few words, either to all the incongruities which meet us in supposing Christianity a fiction, or to the contrast between its vast and diversified difficulties and the rapidity of its conquests. But thus much we may say:-if any reader can seriously decide that no miracle, open or secret, was necessary to this great and sudden renunciation of habits and principles, simultaneous through many and distant lands, and taking place amidst obloquy and peril,-that reader should henceforth discard as groundless those Rules of Probability, whether respecting public or private conduct, which have been drawn from the qualities of human nature and the constitution of human society."-vol. i. p. 332. With this position of things as they really were, the second volume opens. "Christianity, • . combined with its disadvantageous origin and the great obstacles actually opposed to it, could not have triumphed as it did, without some other miracle, or rather some series of miracles, in its support. For that which is a morally miraculous feature in its scheme, the absence of accommodation to all the corrupt tastes of mankind, was, in fact, a miracle of repulsion, adapted to preclude its acceptance, unless that acceptance had been urged by some strong counteractive attestations of divinity."-vol. ii. pp. 1. The author then, for the first time in this part of his argument, lays hold upon the Resurrection of Christ, as the one and pre-eminent miracle, the belief of which, even infidels must acknowledge, was the fulcrum of the lever that has actually moved the world. He argues upon this fact with great felicity and power; yet, with a scrupulosity which could not fail to impress with a conviction of honour and ingenuousness even the most determined infidel, if he retained (yet where is the determined infidel that does retain?) a spark of love to integrity and truth. The objections and evasions which malignity could invent or desire, which crooked ingenuity might imagine, which alarmed prejudice might welcome, are fairly stated and patiently examined. This portion of the work is indeed, to our feeling, singularly impressive and convincing. But we know too much of the intellectual injustice, the resolute infatuation of the deistical character, to expect that even so fine a piece of frank and lucid reasoning would be allowed to produce any good effect upon minds so prépossessed. They need to undergo a different process, the production of mental honesty, "the creation of a new heart and a right spirit." A new and extensive dependency in Mr. Sheppard's chain of argument now appears. From considerations elaborated by profound and original reasoning, he shows that, to solve the entire problem of the early and extensive prevalence of Christianity, there is an antecedent probability that other miracles were wrought, accompanying the first message of apostolic Christianity, and attesting, particularly to the heathen auditors, both the reality of the facts announced and the authorized capacity of the announcer. This part of the work is not only extensive but deeply complicated. Our intelligent readers, whose minds are not unversed in habits of intense thought and the tracing of many consecutive ideas, will, perhaps, form an approximating conception of it from a portion of the concluding paragraph. of doctrine which generates and inculcates theirs. It is probable that he should thus cause truth to triumph over falsehood in her own favourite expedients, and far outvie the cunning craftiness of men, in the benign simplicity of genuine miracles as well as of true doctrine. It is probable, also, that these miracles, in favour of the truth, should be for a time frequent, various, and repeated; and wrought in different places, by different teachers of the same truths: inasmuch as the witnessing of them, however ineffectual with prejudice and adverse spirits, would be yet much more efficacious than mere testimony; and their succession and variety, by permitting repeated observation, would tend to obviate that pre-judgment of magic or collusion which might arise concerning one or few. It is probable also, I conceive, that, when their nonconfutation and their triumphant effects had evinced their reality, and when other proofs of the revelation had also been superadded, these would be withdrawn."-vol. ii. p. 108. Hence, the author proceeds to the inquiry into positive evidence that the additional miracles, whose utility, if not necessity, had thus been à priori established, were actually wrought by those whom Jesus sent to make known to men his message of truth and grace. But this positive evidence, according to the peculiar plan of the work, must not be of the most direct and plainly appropriated kind, the reality and solidity of which sort of proofs have been demonstrated by many well-known writers; but it is to be collected from reluctant and illwilled witnesses, the sworn and devoted of the adverse party; from their cavils, their accusations, their unwelcome admissions, their inadvertent implications. From this class of testimony, whose direct purpose was only the breathing out of hate and malice, the author has extracted a surprising body of evidence; evidence, the value of which may be best appreciated by the suitor or the lawyer, who triumphantly establishes his cause in court out of the mouths of the opposing witnesses. give the abstract of this part of the investigation. We "(1.) The Talmuds, or ancient and authorized commentaries of the Jews on their own scriptures, repeatedly record the pretensions of the disciples of Jesus to miraculous gifts of healing, and even intimate their possession of some such powers, though, as they contend, unlawfully. (2.) The more formal Jewish accounts of the rise of Christianity distinctly mention prodigies to have been expected and "It is not, indeed probable, that a holy demanded by the earliest Christians, as the and exalted Being should cause paltry or pue- signs or credentials of an apostle or envoy of rile or ostentatious miracles to be wrought for Jesus. (3.) The opinions or pretexts of the the attestation of these truths, and in that Jews, as discovered in controversy, ascribe sense compete with a Pythagoras or an Apol- the success of the religion to the magical arts lonius; nor that, except for commensurate of its first teachers. (4.) Most of those heaguilt, he should ordain miracles of destructive then writers of the first ages, who either name or punitive power: but it is probable that he and assail Christianity, or appear covertly to who wrought the beneficent miracle of crea- allude to it, either affirm or hint at pretensions tion, and has manifested his eternal Godhead, of its early propagators to supernatural powshould, when imposture had pretended benefi- ers, to prophesying or divination, magic, and cent miracles for its own base ends, cause si-wonder-working: and Celsus suggests, that milar ones to be verily wrought: at once to display his own moral perfection, and to impress on his creatures the truth of that system they were actually aided by dæmons, and so influenced their converts. (5.) The Emperor Julian, with a studied accumulation of phrase, |