THE GOSPEL FOR THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.*' Tars is a remarkable

book, though it does not seem to us to correspond very closely with the new title chosen for it in the recast which it has suffered since it first appeared under the title, Leaving acs ats Example,—Is it Living, and Why ? That the Gospel of Christ is just as essential to the Nineteenth: Century as to every other century since his coming, we earnestly. believe ; but that it is more especially the Gospel for the nineteenth century than for any other century, except so far as the " increasing purpose " which runs through all the ages is more clearly visible now than in any. Past era, we do not see. Moreover, the choice of this, title for the hook suggests that the author has selected for discussion especially those features in the Gospel of Christ which are now for the first time distinctly visible. But this

suggestion of his new title is not supported by the subject of his book, which makes very little appeal to that class of beliefs.

and convictions which we are supposed to regard as our newest possessions, in spite of the fact that the book has apparently. been suggested by Mr. J. S. Mill's essays on Religion, and that

it takes its stand on that great thinker's admissions. In fact, in,

working out once more with the freshness of a deep personal love and insight the great teaching of Christ's spiritual ex-

ample, and insisting ou the theological inferences to be drawn,

from the fact that that example works with much more than the living power of those purely human examples which are daily presented to our eyes, instead of having lost its vivid- ness in the remoteness of history, our author very rarely enters, upon the peculiar intellectual heritage of our day, or directly adapts his teaching to the atmosphere of " modern thought.' No doubt, his knowledge of the tendencies of modern thought. teaches him to avoid much that is specially distasteful or in- credible to the temper of the day, but it is only in this negative-

direction that his book is greatly affected by the special assump- tions of the Nineteenth Century. Indeed, the new title seems,

to us a mistake. It suggests a class of considerations that we do not find. And it does not suggest the class of considerations- which we do find, and which we find set forth with great sim- plicity, beauty, and force.

The idea of the volume is to connect the moral example o2 Christ with the teaching that Christ is God manifested in humanity, and hence a power who can enable all men who. accept his yoke to become like him. The author insists that

in order to give true significance and reality to Christ's human example, you must regard the knowledge, foreknowledge, and general conditions of his life as those of a finite, though pro- phetic nature ; and that so to regard them, is by no means inconsistent with a belief in his divine essence, but even neces- sary to belief in that divine essence, if the taking up of it human career was to be anything but a dramatic representa- tion. In the appendix our author indicates how far, in his belief, this true limitation and growth of Christ's human nature is to be reconciled with his divine essence and pre- existence ; but he insists, with great force, that all reality is taken from the Scriptual narrative of Christ's life if, when Christ asks for information, it is to be assumed that he already had what be asked for, and when he declares his ignorance of

the time at which an event is to happen, you are to say that the ignorance was impossible. Further, our author points out that Christ's chief spiritual characteristics, his perfect sub- mission to a lot from which he still prayed to be delivered, hag

inexhaustible patience with the infirmities and errors of others, and, above all, his infinite trust in God, lose their beauty and reality, if the submission was not submission to something above him, but mere acquiescence in his own decrees, if his patience was not due to sympathy with the weakness of others, but rather to an absolute knowledge of how they must and would act, and if his trust in God were mere self-contemplation under another

* The (lovelier the Nineteenth Century. Fourth Edition, London : Longtuana and Co. form. All this is, of course, most true, and it is perfectly clear that the author of this book urges it from no momentary doubt as to the true divinity and eternal sonship of Christ, but with the sincere belief, which he exhibits in the later part of the book, that the true divinity and -eternal sonship of Christ re- quired this divesting himself for a time of those attributes which are inconsistent with a true human experience, and would have been entirely inconsistent with the affectation of a human experience which was false, and not true. Wo say this only by way of explanation of the author's true theology. For the real power of the book consists in his interpretation of the example of Christ from the point of view of Christ's real humanity, though of a humanity, of course, enlarged by even higher prophetic gifts than the highest of those which the greatest of his forerunners had possessed. From this point of view, much that is very striking, and in some sense, at least, original, is urged upon the reader ;—this, for instance, as to Christ's relation to the Scriptures, as he augured the fulfilment in his own life of their various Messianic anticipations :- " To him the volume of the book' was far more than it could be to any other child of man. It was not only his Father's word—it was not only the lamp of his feet and the light of his path in the ordinary sense—it was far more than this. Search the Scriptures,' he said to the Jews, for they are they which testify of me.' Not a prophecy which did not boar upon his life, or-his work, or office; hardly a psalm which he could not take into his lips as though it were written for him. It was of him or for him that prophets and psalmists had written. When, carried out of themselves, they poured forth the deepest utterances of inspiration, they testified beforehand his sufferings and the glory which should be revealed. What, then, must those prophetic writings have been to him who was the subject of them I With what feelings, as time went on, most ho have realised the fulfilment of each prediction. How thoroughly imbued his mind must have been with their spirit ! We see this in his fre- quent allusions to the subject when conversing with his Apostles : He told thorn how it is written of the Son of Man that he must suffer many things, and be set at nought ;" Behold, we go up to Jeru- salem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man shall be accomplished;' ' Truly the Son of Man goeth as it is written of him ;" But I say unto you that this which is written must yet be accomplished in me, and be was reckoned among the transgressors." 0 fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken : ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory P' We are so accustomed to think of Christ as fulfilling the predictions of Scripture, that we do not at all realise what it must have been to him, whose heart and mind were as human as our own, to road his own life by the light of those pro- phecies, and to note in each now trial and suffering the fulfilment of them. How much is revealed of his Inman heart in the words,

The things concerning me have an end !' Tho submission of Christ to the Jewish Scriptures is all the more remarkable when his claim to exercise paramount authority over the positive enact- ments of the Jewish Law is remembered. We see a striking instance of this in his teaching with regard to the Sabbath. He not only refused to enforce on his disciples the rabbinical rules for the strict observance of the day, but he also claimed authority to modify the rules which Moses had given. The Son of Man is Lord also of the Sabbath,' was his startling reply to the objectors. It was no blind adherence, then, to the letter of Scripture which led him to make Scripture his guide. Ho clearly discriminated, not only between the letter and the spirit, but also between what was of merely tem-

porary obligation and what was lasting and unchangeable—between that which belonged to the Mosaic economy and that which was for

all time. It was this which contributed more than anything else to his ultimate rejection by the Jewish nation. They clung to the letter that killeth.' He contended for ' the Spirit that givoth life.' It is this which makes his submission to Scripture so wonderful:— notwithstanding the authority which he claimed in this respect over Scripture, he submitted himself to the spiritual guidance of Scripture ; he made it the rule of his life. Notwithstanding that the Jewish Scriptures were to be completed and perfected, and rendered infinitely more precious by the history of his life and death—notwith- standing that his own teaching was in the highest degree inspired, and that the words of his lips were to be for all future ages more precious than rubies, more to be desired than fine gold, sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb '—notwithstanding that he was him- self both tho corner-stone and the crowning glory of the building—he yielded from first to last the most perfect submission to Scripture. What an example for us! It is us when a king teaches his subjects to reverence the law, by himself submitting to its authority and guidance,"

That is a very fine passage, and especially that reference to our Lord's saying, " The things concerning me have an end," the context of which our author has not referred to. The con- text is sufficiently remarkable. It is after his prediction of Peter's threefold denial, uttered at the Last Supper. " And lie said unto them, When I sent you without purse, and scrip, and shoes, lacked ye anything P And they said, Nothing. Then he said unto them, But now, ho that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip ; and he that bath no sword, lot him sell his garment and buy one: For I say unto you, that this that is written must yet be accomplished

in me, And he was reckoned among the trangressors : for the things concerning me have an end. And they said, Lord, behold, here are two swords. And he said, unto them, It is enough." That seems to us to 'be a very explicit confirmation of our author's view that Christ, in his human life, saw the future partially irradiated. by the light of prophecy, and partially concealed. As the Messianic prophecies verged towards their fulfilment, he seems here to say that his own human power of prophetic foresight stops short with theirs : gazing into the dark future for his disciples, he could hardly tell them what might and might not be needful for them, when the time had come that he himself was to be " numbered. with the transgressors ;" he could not assure them that they might not need the ordinary precautions of human providence,—they too might be deprived, as he was to be for a time deprived, of the clear evidence of God's all-pervading love, and as they were not prepared for it, as he was, they might need to guard themselves iu the ordinary, short-sighted human way, against the ordinary human wants and the ordinary human violence. But when the disciples, in their earthly and literal way, take this anxiety about their future, during the darkness of the hours when he was to be " numbered with the transgressors," as an intimation that the hour of a display of human force was near, he puts the suggestion aside at once with something of gentle irony. "It is enough,"—two swords were enough, and more than enough, for the sort of emergency of which they were thinking.

Our author illustrates Christ's perfect human character on all its sides with great freshness and power. Take, for example, this, on his perfect trust in God:-

" In nothing was his perfect trust in God more plainly shown than in the confidence with which he looked forward to the completion of his work after his own death. If we consider the position in which he stood towards the close of his ministry, we shall see how extra- ordinary, when soon from our present point of view, this confidence was. Ho has a few devoted followers. Of the rest of the nation, some believe in him, but are afraid to confess him ; many more are in doubt concerning him ; while the vast majority reject his claims. Ho stands nearly alone among men ; his death is imminent, and he knows it ; he has foretold it. He knows that in a short time he will be put to a painful and ignominious death ; yet he looks with a calm confidence which nothing can shake to the triumph of his cause after his death. Death is to him not the termination of his existence, but an entrance on a higher state, in which he is to reap the fruits of his earthly toil,—nay, it is by dying that he is to achieve the victory. He is content to bear with patience the present apparent failure of that cause, looking forward to its certain success in the future. Tho ground of this confidence is trust in God. Unmanlyspeaking, nothing could have been more improbable than the success of his cause. His own death was at hand ; his fol- lowers, devoted to him as they were, were altogether unequal to the

task of carrying on his work, even if they had comprehended his designs, which they certainly did not ; yet he leaves the work with

perfect confidence in God's hands. He sees his death approaching, and lie takes a solemn and affectionate farewell of his disciples. He tells them that they will forsake him in the hour of peril—that one of them will deny him. Notwithstanding this proof of their weakness, be treats them with confidence ; he speaks confidently of seeing them again ; he tells them that God will send his Spirit to fit thorn for the work they have to do ; that thus they shall be guided into all truth. This gift of the Comforter will be in answer to his prayers. He will abide with them for over. Thus the work shall be carried on, until the world shall be convinced of sin, of righteous. ness, and of judgment."

And equally striking is his illustration of Christ's perfect calm- ness and self-possession. There is no fine writing in the work, but there is no weak writing.

The hitter and more properly theological portion of the book is less powerful than the spiritual and moral portion.

But it, too, contains much that is fine. Take, for example, this, ou the moral identity between the spirit of Christ's life and the spirit of God's Providence, as illustrated in the history of our race :—

" The mode of God's government of the world teaches us that his highest perfection is goodness. He hes revealed himself in history as a Moral Power. This revelation of God in history exactly corresponds with the revelation of God in Christ. The God revealed to us in the life and death of Christ is a God who subdues men by the power of goodness; who casts aside physical force in his dealings with men, as though it were a weapon unworthy of himself and of them. We seem, in following the earthly life of Christ, to lie following the foot- steps of the same Moral Power which has striven and borne with men through the countless generations of the past. So completely in the moral government of the world is the Divinity veiled from the eyes of sense, so hidden is every power but that of goodness, that men have been found in every ago of the world who have said—There is no God. This exactly agrees with the character of the Divine Manifestation in Christ. There, too, we see the same veiling of every power but that of goodness. The life of Christ seems an epitome of that which has befallen the Moral Power in the history of the world. la history we see the Moral Power seeking no aid from mere brute from the agriculturist in an Eastern country. The more care- force ; often despised and rejected of men ; opposed, hated, trodden

fully the Indian revenue is examined, the more necessary must under foot, condemned, scourged, crucified ; yet always rising again ; triumphant in defeat, victorious in death. Christ in his earthly war- the invaluable sum raised by the tax on aud the exportation of fare with evil, Christ hanging on the cross, Christ rising from the opium appear to be. Sir Richard puts the facts of the ease dead, repeats in another form that which has befallen the Mural plainly before his readers, aud speaks in a very guarded Power in its warfare with evil, as seen iu all history." manner of the objections of the Chinese Government. He This is indeed a gospel for the nineteenth century, as for all says :—

centuries, though we do not see the special propriety of term- " It seems, however, to be held by some authorities that the ing it The Gospel for the Nin,eteenth, Century, since it is Chinese Government, objecting on moral grounds to the consumption certainly not a gospel which those who think themselves the of opium, desires to prohibit the importation of Indian opium into most representative of the intellect of the nineteenth century China, but is prevented from so doing by the existing commercial are at all likely to welcome, or even receive.