and Cardinal Bembo reveled in a licentiousness of composition, unsurpassed by any of the flagitious writers of ancient or modern times. Sacred literature, indeed, was utterly unknown to the vast majority of the literati; nor do we discern any inducement to its cultivation, in their lives or characters as private men, in their public stations or social intercourse.

This survey of the causes leads us to conclude, that when the Reformation arrived, the state of things was singularly unfavorable to the cause of Sacred Literature, and eminently propitious to that of classical. The age of the Reformation is, with the single exception of the Christian æra, the most remarkable period, in the annals of time. It came to republish the Religion of the Cross, and to deliver from the darkness and thralldem of the Church and the State, the civil and political branches of knowledge, and all the departments of philosophy and literature. It was, indeed, another age of Apostles and Martyrs, another age of Christian Fathers. The last of the Romans had perished in the dungeon of Theodoric; but more than Roman souls lived in the bosoms of Luther and Calvin. Around them circled a host of kindred spirits, not as the satellites of their power and glory, but as constituent though inferior stars of the holy constellation of Reformers. Had we beheld the origin and progress, the character and objects of their warfare, could we have imagined it possible, that they would not have bequeathed to all posterity, the Bible, as an essential element in every stage of education, and Sacred Literature, as the most noble and valuable department of Universal Literature? Yet this age, so fruitful in the great and the good, in the divine and the scholar; in the courage that quailed, neither at the sceptre of princes, nor at the thunders of the Vatican; and in the spirit, which regenerated Christianity and remodeled the whole circle of the sciences, even this age passed away, and left unfinished the glorious work of Religious Education and Sacred Literature. And yet the monument of the Reformers is the most sublime in its conception, the most durable in its materials, the most perfect in its execution, which the genius and learning of Man have ever erected to immortalize his fame. In the inscription, indeed, which records the achievments of the departed great and good, blanks are left at intervals, yet what are they but the fragment-verses in the Epic of the prince of Latin Poets?

We have now surveyed those excellences of the Scriptures, which place the title of Sacred Literature above the claims of every other: and we have considered the reasons, why the former was so entirely neglected as an inseparable part of all education, at the revival of learning, and even during the progress of the Reformation. Although Europe has produced from time to time her Herbelots and Hottingers, her Buxtorfs, Pococks and Lowths,* yet still Sacred Literature has never been regarded as the superior, nor even as the equal of the classics. These have been courted and patronized as the teachers of the young, from youth to manhood, while Sacred Literature, undervalued and deserted, hangs her harp on the willow, and weeps by the rivers of Babylon. Sacred Literature is intimately connected with religion, and though it be possible, at least in a sectarian point of view, to keep them almost entirely if not altogether apart; yet the total banishment of the former from all our schemes of education, must have an unfavorable effect upon the latter. Let us now proceed to the inquiry, whether serious disadvantages do not arise from this state of things.

1. The miserable ignorance of the Literature of the Scriptures that prevails among the great body of educated laymen must ever be a formidable barrier to the study of the Bible with them. That Book, so full of attractions for learning and taste, is to most of them an unsightly object: and Foster might well have assigned this as the fundamental cause of the aversion of men of taste, to evangelical religion. How indeed, can they respect and value the Bible, as a storehouse of Literature, when the opportunity has never been afforded of becoming acquainted with its beauties? Shall it be said that we degrade the Scriptures, by making them a text book of Literature, and that it does not become their holiness and dignity, to invite to their perusal, as though they consisted of Orations and Poems? But if a course of Sacred Literature, sound, tasteful and learned, will recommend the Bible to the respect and even admiration of many, who now regard it with indifference, not to say with contempt, an important end is attained, whether we regard the individuals, or the cause of religion. They will be induced

* Note H.

to read and to study what they would otherwise never have looked at, and can we doubt, that some, perhaps many might be led eventually to a pious life? And with regard to the cause of religion, is it not obvious, that numbers, though not religious, would yet, for the sake of their attachment to Sacred Literature, favor Christianity, would patronize the benevolent enterprises of the day, and would respect all the institution and officers of religion. Alexander saved the house of Pindar, and Prince Eugene, the residence of Fenelon; while Demetrius Poliorcetes spared that quarter of Rhodes, where Protogenes was painting. Something assuredly, of a kindred spirit would be found in many a bosom, which had been familiarized in youth with the beauties of Sacred Literature.

2. But we may present the argument with still greater force, by considering the value of Sacred Literature to the pious. Will any one deny that the study of the sublime and the beautiful in the natural world, affords to the educated religious man, noble and delightful illustrations of the power and wisdom, and goodness of his Creator? And is it possible that still more affecting and interesting views will not be drawn from the beauties of the Bible, to exemplify the same attributes? Shall the land and the ocean, the forest, the river and the mountain, attest the glory and benevolence of God, and shall the use, which is made in the Scriptures of the various objects of the visible world, be regarded with indifference? The good man will find his piety exalted and purified, his understanding enlightened, his moral taste refined, by cultivating an intimate knowledge of the Literature of the Bible, and a strong relish for its rich variety of beauties. When Dionysius the Elder, robbed the Statue of Jupiter of its golden mantle, and cast over its shoulders a woolen cloak, he was guilty of that species of Sacrilege, which we commit, when we strip the Bible of its Literature. For ourselves, we should feel, if compelled to abandon the Literature of the Scriptures for life, as the Naturalist Loquin, when he exclaimed on his death bed, “O richesses infinies de la Nature, il faut donc vous quitter !" 3. Nor let us overlook the fact, that the general neglect of sacred Literature has necessarily an unfavorable effect on the acquisition of it, by the Clergy. Instead of being department of all liberal education, it is never touched, till

a

the course of divinity is commenced. Hence, instead of being regarded habitually, as a part of the religious instruction of the young, and a chief constituent in the whole progress of their improvement, from the primary school to the University, it comes to be considered as exclusively theological. It is not surprising then that it should languish, as it does, in the keeping of the clergy; when it is only an inhabitant of theological Halls, and only the companion of theological students. It is impossible for the clergyman to feel its full dignity and beauty, or to realize that it is the common privilege and common property of all the educated, whilst it is confined to the chair of the Divinity ProfesAnd when he knows that of the hundreds, who listen to his preaching, frequently not one knows any thing of Sacred Literature, or has the least relish for its beauties, he must feel that silence on such a subject, though unnatural, is imposed by necessity.

sor.

4. All must be sensible that this state of things contributes to lower the standard of literary spirit, and of literary composition among the clergy. What a field would be open to the preacher, in the opinion of the classical scholar, if the resources and beauties of ancient Literature were admissible in the pulpit! The discourse of Horseley on the prophecies of the Messiah, scattered among the Heathen, is indeed an illustration of the admirable use, that can be made of Literature, in the sacred desk; but it shows us also, how rarely and with how much difficulty, the classics can be resorted to by the minister of the Gospel. But the pulpit is the natural home of a nobler, richer, better Literature,-Sacred Literature. Yet until it shall be a department of all education, and therefore of the education of the clergy, from their earliest years, we shall not see, in the prime and in the eventide of life, those selectest influences of Sacred Literature, which could be the offspring only of early impressions. We would say of Sacred Literature, a more dignified and suitable theme for the pen of a Christian Father, what St. Augustine says of Virgil; "Virgilium pueri legant, ut poeta magnus omniumque præclarissimus atque optimus, teneris imbibitus annis, non facile oblivione possit aboleri."

5. Another unfortunate circumstance, arising from the general neglect of Sacred Literature, is in our judgment, the ascendancy of the Heathen Classics, in all our schemes of education. It is not stating it too strongly to say, that

christians-yes, professors, of the religion of the crossyea, the very ministers of that cross, have resolved, may we not say inexorably resolved, that in schools and colleges, the PAGANS of Greece and Rome shall form the minds, the hearts and the characters of CHRISTIAN youth. And yet, of all the multitude, who thus combine to maintain a state of things, so singular, so unnatural, so unpropitious, not one, will admit a comparison between the Bible and the Classics, whether we look to Duty and Usefulness, or to Literature. Ask them-do you believe, that the apostles would have founded or sanctioned such a scheme? Ask them-can the spirits of just men made perfect, behold it from their seats of bliss, with approving eyes? Ask them-can the angels, in the realms of light and glory, look down with applause on this idolatrous exaltation of the Classics, on this rejection, this degradation of the Scriptures? Their answer, we venture to say, will be negative. George Fabricius would not use a word in his poems, which savored in the least of paganism: and he exceedingly condemned those Christians, who resorted for their materials to the divinities of Parnassus, and the fables of the ancient Mythology. Would that hundreds, who have spent half a century of their length of life in illustrating and recommending the Classics, had felt like Fabricius, and had spent but a tithe of that time, in illustrating and recommending Sacred Literature!

*

We are not enemies to the cultivation of classical learning, at a suitable age, in an appropriate place, and by those, who will receive profit, without injury. Like Petrarch's father, we would not in our wrath, hurl the Classics of our sons into the fire. Like Cheynel, when he flung the detested book of Chillingworth into his grave, we would not bury them in our anger. Like Watteau, when he shrunk on his death-bed from the miserably painted crucifix; like the dying Malherbe, when he rebuked the bad French of his confessor, we would not carry the fastidiousness of Christian taste so far, as to banish from the whole circle of education, the poet, or the orator, the historian, or the philosopher of antiquity. But we do protest, and if fifty years more of life were to be our lot, we should protest to the

* Note 1.