and reverently anticipate will probably be the burden of his message? If we have not erred altogether, he can hardly fail to treat with some of Luther's scorn the notion of a progress of revelation by means of disciples and subordinates, beyond and above that which was delivered by the Master himself. He will recognize in the unsystematic and authoritative teaching of Christ the highest, most adequate, and every way most perfect forms of which the truths of the spiritual world are capable in human words. He will brand with some of Luther's contempt that systematizing spirit which presumes to exhibit a more symmetrical and harmonious scheme of doctrine, for the spiritual wants of mankind, than that which Christ has revealed; which perverts and distorts the revelations of the gospel; which misunderstands one truth, explains away another, and denies everything which cannot be successfully manipulated; in order that the miserable remnants may be made to fit and dovetail together in logical connections. In the schism of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin by the worship of the golden calves, in consequence of which the people of God were involved in long and bloody civil wars, so that they could no longer make successful resistance against the heathen, but were all carried away into captivity and bondage to the world, from which a few only returned — in all this some future Luther will find prefigured, in graphic details, the schisms, sectarianism, and theological wars of the church during the last three hundred years, in which she lost the consciousness of her high calling to subdue the heathen nations unto Christ, set up the idolatry of material wealth, and sold herself for nought into captivity and bondage to the world. He will recall the remnant of God's people out of this worse than Babylonish captivity and Egyptian bondage, from this slavery to the world, and lead them back into spiritual freedom and true holiness, so that the church will be enabled to exhibit, in the restoration of her catholic unity, that sign from God upon which Christ has covenanted that the world shall believe and be saved. He

will trample under his feet, or burn in the market-place, as Luther burned the pope's bull, all sectarian creeds and symbols, as not conformed to the deliverances of Christ, and which make no due allowances for those differences of opinion. in non-essentials which are inseparable from various degrees of intellectual ability and culture and spiritual enlightenment, and which are essential to all healthy growth and progress. He will believe and trust to the promise of the gift of the Spirit of God to all true believers to guide them into all necessary truth, so that they cannot be left to go fatally astray. He will understand that which is essential to a true and living faith as it was understood when the Apostles' Creed was the only symbol of the church, with which inscribed upon her banners she fought the great battle of the ages, and the ancient towers and bulwarks of paganism went down in flaming ruins before the strength of her faith and the fervor of her zeal.

Finally, our coming Luther, we venture to forecast, will set us a new example of preaching in the manner of Christ in the Gospels, rather than of Paul in his abstruse discussions with his countrymen. He will not preach to Gentiles as if they were Jews, and had Jewish prejudices and difficulties to overcome. The staple of his sermons will not be the secret purposes of God, but things revealed; not predestination, nor election, nor justification by faith, but the person and work of Christ, the forgiveness of sins, reconciliation with God, and salvation by faith. He will address his preaching to those spiritual wants which all men feel, rather than to those into which they must be laboriously educated before they can feel them. And the common people will hear him gladly, as they heard Christ. They will no longer run to the Circean swine-troughs of sensationalism, when the bread of life is offered them as Christ offered it. And then, not before, the vast multitudes who now seem to be hopelessly alienated from the church will return to her sacred pale.

ARTICLE III.

ERASMUS DARWIN.

BY REV. THOMAS HILL, D.D., LL.D., FORMERLY PRESIDENT OF HARVARD

COLLEGE.

ERASMUS DARWIN was born in Nottinghamshire, England, in 1731. Educated at Cambridge, and pursuing medical studies at Edinburgh, he began the practice of medicine at Lichfield, in Staffordshire, in 1756. Married in 1757, he was left a widower in 1770, with three sons. The eldest, Charles, gave great promise of brilliant talent, but died early in life from a wound received in dissecting; the second, Erasmus, Jr., showed no taste for science, and died a bachelor; the third, Robert Darwin, became a distinguished physician. Eight years after the death of his wife, Dr. Darwin fell greatly in love, at first meeting, with Mrs. Pole; but as Colonel Pole was living the passion was only allowed to exhale in gallant verses to one whom he called "doomed forever to another's arms." The "forever" lasted, however, only about two years, when the Colonel died, and Darwin laid suit in earnest. Mrs. Pole consented, but on one stern condition the doctor must leave Lichfield. He married her in 1781, and moved to Derby, where he remained happily with her until his death in 1802. During the twenty-five years' residence in Lichfield he drew about him some distinguished admirers and friends; among them Thomas Day, the author of Sanford and Merton, and Richard Edgeworth, the father of his more celebrated daughter Maria.

His fame and skill as a practising physician were very great; and his treatment of diseases is, I understand, acknowledged by the best physicians of to-day to have been judicious and energetic. It was only in the reasons he gave for his action that he failed. He placed the greatest re

liance upon diet and regimen. Good beef, mutton, and poultry, milk and fruits; great abstemiousness in fermented liquors, and total abstinence from distilled; plenty of outdoor exercise, and well ventilated rooms within; these were his very sensible hobbies. Undoubtedly some of his fame was due to the personal attractions of his character. Although inclined to be somewhat sceptical in religious matters, he was always decorous and respectful in speaking of the opinions of others; and he showed many of the best virtues of a Christian character. His omnivorous appetite for knowledge, the fruitfulness of his fancy, the playfulness of his irony, made him an agreeable companion; his great taste for botany and landscape gardening were indulged upon his grounds; and the hospitality of his house increased the attraction. Naturally somewhat clumsy in his appearance and movement, his awkwardness was increased by his breaking his knee-pan on occasion of one of his tumbles from a gro tesque sulky of his own contrivance. But neither his lameness, nor the deep pits left by the small-pox, nor his inveterate stuttering created any repulsion that could long weigh against the attraction of his kindness, his learning, and his wit, the solidity of his sense, and the playfulness of his nonsense.

During many years, from 1771 to 1794, he labored upon a work called "Zoönomia; or, the Laws of Life." Before he gave it to the press, however, he wrote a poem called the "Botanic Garden." It was begun, Miss Seward tells us, about the year 1779, that is, soon after the time when he first met Mrs. Pole. He had purchased a fine location near Lichfield, and laid it out as a garden. This gives the title to the poem, which consists of two parts-first, the economy of vegetation; second, the loves of the plants. This second part, which is lighter and more playful, was published first. The plot is exceedingly simple. The Goddess of Botany (described in the first part) having retired, the Muse of Botany steps forward, and enumerates to the listening sylphs and gnomes various plants and flowers; describing each plant as a beautiful woman, attended by as many adoring

lovers as the flower has stamens; or (if the plant has more pistils than one) as two or more females, attended by their appropriate number of males. The description by the muse being ended, the sylphs and gnomes retired; and Night, creeping up on tiptoe, bade the nightingale repeat the strains.

The plot of the first part-the economy of vegetation is equally simple. The Goddess of Botany descends to the garden; and the gnomes, nymphs, and sylphs receive from her their orders, in what way to bring forth the flowers and fruits in their season. Having given the commissions, the goddess takes to her chariot, and is borne by the zephyrs to the clouds.

Each of the two parts is divided into four cantos, and the whole poem comprises four thousand four hundred and twenty-two verses. The versification is smooth-in fact, too smooth; its melody becomes monotonous. It contains very numerous short passages of great beauty; but the want of plot or connection makes the poem, as a whole, more unreadable than the Paradise Lost. It is rather a collection of exquisite passages than a poem. Its main use, evidently, was to give an opportunity for the notes, which are full and rich beyond description; embracing curious dissertations and observations on almost every possible subject of physical science, with not a few on metaphysics, aesthetics, and theology. It is evident, from contemporaneous writers, that the notes did much toward giving the volume its high popularity immediately upon its publication.

The subsequent volumes in prose, upon Zoönomia and upon Phytologia, have the same character as the notes to the Botanic Garden; they are a thesaurus of curious observations, experiments, and speculations upon the higher regions of physical science the regions where it borders upon psychology and metaphysics. The doctor's style is very clear, both in the prose and in the poetry; he could be understood by all readers; and as his reputed scepticism nowhere appeared in his writings, he was offensive to none.

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