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more intimate, we lost our relish for the Horsley style of criticism, and are not conscious of being indebted to his productions in this department for any real light on the passages that more especially need the aid of an interpreter. What is peculiar to himself we have almost invariably found, on closer examination, to turn out untenable.

might be referred to as of a groundless and arbitrary character, in particular the idea which he announces as a principle of interpretation for the prophetical Scriptures in general, that the prophets often start, as if per saltum, from the first to the second advent of Christ; and that though they should speak, almost in the same breath, of mercy and judgment alike in connexion with his appearance, yet the one must be How should it have happened, that a mind so referred to the first, the other only to his second highly gifted, and seemingly so much bent in this coming. But we rather point, for another illustra- particular direction, should, after all, have failed to tion, to the discourses on the 45th Psalm, where there advance its favourite pursuit? We believe the groundare several most incorrect and groundless represen- element of the failure lay in the constitution of the tations, such as the distinguishing between the Jew- mind itself, which, however distinguished for clearish and Gentile Churches, as if they had a separate ness of perception, comprehension of view, and viplace and standing in the Psalmist's delineation (con- gour of thought, was deficient in that delicacy of trary to the whole tenor of Scripture, and especially feeling which thoroughly sympathizes with the oriof prophetical Scripture, which often indeed speaks ginal writers, and that spirit of cautious, subdued, of Jew and Gentile, but never of a Jewish and a painstaking investigation, without which it is imGentile Church, as distinct individualities-Scripture possible to achieve any thing of importance in the knows but of one Church under all dispensations); walks of criticism. Naturally bold, enterprising, and and also when, following out this mistaken idea, he impatient of restraint, he was too apt to seek, by rash views the exhortation, "Hearken, O daughter, and speculation or ingenious but hasty deduction, to acconsider, and incline thine ear, forget also thine own complish what could only be reached by long-contipeople, and thy father's house," as an address to the nued inquiry and profound research. What has Hebrew Church, calling upon her to forget the Jew-sometimes been foolishly said of him by way of euloish religion and ceremonies-again running counter to gium, "that he never found a difficulty," virtually the uniform style of the prophets, which always re- pronounces his condemnation; for it betrays the presents the fathers of the Jewish people as emphati- rashness with which he called in the aid of his fancy cally the men of God, and a return to them, not an to help out the imperfection of less expert, but more alienation from them, as the dutiful part for their de- legitimate, resources. His critical writings, consescendants. quently, partake largely of the speculative and conjectural character, and make no satisfactory advance in the work of interpretation, because they pay too little deference to the fixed laws of interpretationmove far too much in the arbitrary and unsettled region of individual opinion.

These things, and others of a similar kind, occasionally presenting themselves in the sermons, plainly call for the exercise of a spirit of discrimination; they indicate a certain degree of rashness and haste in particular parts, and even a want of thorough insight into the relations of the Old and the New in Scriptare. Yet, notwithstanding such exceptions, the discourses of Horsley are unquestionably productions of a high order, and usually exhibit the meaning of Scripture with great power and faithfulness. But for the more professedly critical and expository parts of his productions, comprising six out of the nine volumes of the uniform edition of his works, we must speak in a much more qualified tone. They have frequently been lauded as valuable contributions to the critical study of Old Testament scripture (for to that division of the Bible they all belong), but they have never, excepting with a limited number of persons in this country, attained to much authority as learned expositions, and out of Britain they seem almost entirely unknown. We do not remember to have seen so much as a passing allusion to them in any of the more learned commentaries of other countries; and the more that the cultivation of sacred learning proceeds in this country, they seem to be falling the more into the background.

We are not much surprised at this, for it accords substantially with what has taken place in the history of our own experience. When not far from the commencement of our critical studies on Old Testament scripture, the translations and notes of Horsley stood high in our list of authorities-they appeared to strike out such rich meanings, and with such bold freedom to chear a way through many hard and obscure sentences, that nothing in our youthful apprehension could equal the sagity and depth of his critical talent. But, continually as our investigations proceeded, and our acquaintance with the peculiarities of the sacred penmen, in thought and diction, became

It was an unhappy contingence, and tended greatly to feed this wrong bias in Bishop Horsley's mental constitution, that his lot was cast in a time when, after a long period of dearth and superficiality in regard to the interpretation of Scripture, especially of Old Testament scripture, critics had begun to indulge in the most wanton license, and sought to improve men's knowledge of Scripture very much by improving Scripture itself. When a passage occurred of difficult interpretation, an attempt to clear the difficulty was sure to be made by a proposed emendation in the text-altering some of the letters so as to make new words, or transposing some of the words so as to make new sentences, or, finally, throwing the sentences into a new order, so as to make a better connexion. This species of critical skill had been carried to its perfection by some who were in high repute about the time that Horsley began to turn his attention to this department of labour-such as Capellus, Houbigant, Lowth, Hare, in some degree also Kennicott, and various others both in this country and on the Continent. The greater portion of Horsley's translations and critical notes seem to have been written under the influence of this capricious school of emendators; and it was only in his later years that he became alive to its unsatisfactory nature and dangerous liberties. A better spirit in this respect appears in his work on Hosea, published in his own lifetime, though within a few years of its close, and which, from this characteristic alone, we gather to have been, as to its preparation, subsequent in point of time to his other productions in the same line. We regret we should be left only to gather this, and that the collected edition of his works, though pub

lished by the respectable house of Longman, and edited by the author's own son, should be so utterly void of information respecting even the comparative dates of his productions, or of any attempt to account for the occasional defects and discrepancies they discover. If they had been dug out of some obscure corner a hundred years after his death, and brought to light by some entire stranger, they could not have appeared in a more shapeless and disjointed condition. But, in regard to the point now under consideration, there can be no doubt that the work on Hosea was, in its main part at least, composed after the rest; for not only is it comparatively free from the error as to textual emendations which pervades them, but it delivers, in the Introduction, a strong protest against the error itself. "Against this opinion," he says-the opinion that the chief difficulties arise from corruptions in the Hebrew text—“ I must openly and earnestly protest, it is an erroneous opinion, pregnant with the most mischievous consequences. ... That the corruptions in any part are so numerous, or in such degree, as to be a principle cause of obscurity, or, indeed, to be a cause of obscurity at all, with the utmost confidence I deny. And, be the corruptions what they may, I must protest against the ill-advised measure, as to me it seems, however countenanced by great examples, of attempting to remove any obscurity supposed to arise from them by what is called conjectural emendations. Considering the matter only as a problem in the doctrine of chances, the odds are always infinitely against conjecture; for one instance in which it may restore the original reading, in one thousand, or more, it will only leave corruption worse confounded." We cordially assent to the soundness of the principle embodied in this extract; but, unfortunately, the author was so late in discovering it, that the work on Hosea alone derived the benefit of the discovery, and the translations and notes on other portions of Scripture seem to have been left as they originally proceeded from his pen, and are remarkable for nothing more than the frequent disregard they exhibit of the principle which so strongly commended itself to his riper judgment.

It was well for our author to have thus reached a sound conclusion, where, at an earlier period, he had so frequently erred; but there was still another avenue for the display of an arbitrary spirit of interpretation, viz., in regard to the meanings of words and the construction of sentences. And here to the last he exhibited a false taste, especially in regard to the senses put upon unusual, and sometimes even upon quite common, words. That his chief authority for the meanings he adopts should so often be Parkhurst -the most capricious and arbitrary of lexicographers -is itself a sufficient indication how lax and unsatisfactory his practice was in this respect; and, in a multitude of cases, the specific sense he prefers rests upon no other ground than an etymological derivation-of itself a very unsafe guide in interpretation, and only to be resorted to in extreme cases. It would take us too long, however, to support the legation now made by an adequate number of examples, nor will it be necessary for such as are acquainted with his writings: a plenitude of examples

cannot fail to have occurred to themselves.

ing-here a solid and satisfactory explanation, there another entirely the reverse; no clear, consistent, and uniform principle of interpretation. Sometimes we are told the words are to be taken in the literal sense, and presently again we find the mystical preferred; but why, in either case, the one rather than the other should be imposed upon our belief, is itself an unresolved mystery. Thus, on the first chapter of Hosea, and in the very same verse, the tenth, "the children of Israel" mentioned in one clause, are understood to be the mystical Israel; while "the place" spoken of in another, where it was to be said of those who once were no people of God, "Ye are the children of the living God," is referred to Jerusalem and the natural Israel. "They shall come up out of the land," or " from the earth," as he unhappily renders it in the last verse of the first chapter, is a literal coming up of the Jews from all parts of the earth to Jerusalem; but the sentence in chap. viii 13, "They shall return into Egypt," is not to be taken literally of a going down to Egypt; it simply indicates their " being reduced to an abject, oppressed condition, like that of the Egyptian servitude." This constant interchanging of the literal and the spiritual, without any grounds of reason shown, and so as merely to suit his own ideas of truth or propriety, pervading, as it does, the most of his notes on the prophecies, but in those on the Psalms appearing in its most capricious and extravagant form, prevents them from throwing any steady and determinate light on the more difficult points connected with the study of the prophetic Word; they can afford no satisfaction to any one who would proceed on sure ground, and go thoroughly into the investigation of the subject. Even on what may be called minor points, such, for example, as the question, whether the command to Hosea, to go and take to himself a wife of infamous character, is to be understood of a transaction in real life, or of what passed in vision before the eye of the prophet, let any one compare the discussion of the subject in Horsley's Introduction with that in Hengstenberg's Christology, and, whichever side of the question be may be disposed to espouse, he cannot but be struck with the immense superiority on the part of the German professor, in critical acumen, exactness of learning, uniformity of princi ple, and thoroughness of investigation. We are confident he will find the same in many other and more important examples if he pursues the comparison through the first three chapters of the prophet.

Finally, The critical productions of Horsley are still further marred by the occasional appearance in them of a tincture of Hutchinsonianism; by which we mean, a disposition to draw from statements of Scripture recondite meanings and discoveries of truth such as no sober inquirer would ever think of deriving from the particular passages. We can point only to a single illustration taken from the work on Hosea: "The cherubim of the temple, and the calves of Dan and Bethel, were both hieroglyphical figures-the one, of God's institution; the other, of al-man's-in direct contravention of the second commandment. The cherub was a compound figure; the calf single. Jeroboam therefore, and subjects, were Unitarians." But if the composition of the symbol determined the character of the worshipper's faith in this respect, une people who kept by the chernhim would not be Trinitarians, for these compound figures consisted, not of three, but of four distinct parts: a four-in-one God, therefore, must

But, beyond this, when we look to the exposition he gives of particular passages, and the views he takes of the topics unfolded in the prophetical Scriptures, we see the same spirit of arbitrarinėss prevail

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have been the object of their worship. Besides, if | just at the point where, as Dr Nichol would say, the cherubic figures were symbols of the Godhead, remoteness passes into invisibility." We have a how could they also fail to be made in violation of strong penchant for the stratified remains of ancient the second commandment? Could God himself set cities, such as those of old Nineveh, lately dug out up what he so stringently forbade his people to by Layard from beneath the sepulchres of many make? This were indeed to establish by his exam- generations, and carrying one back almost to the ple, what he had sought to overthrow in the precept. days of Nimrod; and we delight above all things in On the whole, therefore, we cannot but regard it researches among "sepulchral remains," in which as unfortunate, that Horsley should have adventured the language of the dead, strangely commingling with into the field of biblical criticism and exposition; at the faith of the living, sheds a light on the history least, that he should have done precisely what he of the Church, and where the grave, untrue for once did in it, and no more. He has contributed nothing to its character, is no longer "the house of silence.". to the real stores of sacred learning, or to an exact Judge, then, of our delight in the perusal of The and well-founded acquaintance with the import of Church in the Catacombs-a work which, though it has the original Scriptures. By his high authority and been for some time before the public, has not, we example he did contribute much to the perpetuation think, met with all the attention which its excellence of a false taste and an arbitrary dealing, first with deserves. Without further preface, we beg to carry the letter, and then with the meaning, of the sacred our readers along with us while we follow this inteltext. By much the greater portion of his writings ligent guide through one of the most interesting exin this department are, not only from their fragmen-hibitions of the antique ever opened to the eyes of tary character, of small value, but also, from their modern curiosity. inherent nature, fitted to mislead as much as to guide; they are chiefly to be regarded as productions of talent, indeed, but of talent misapplied, and so yielding little solid fruit; and it is to the productions of another kind-his discourses and controversial writings-that we must still point for the real monuments of his great powers, and for the proof of important services rendered to the cause of scriptural Christianity.

THE CHURCH IN THE CATACOMBS.*

❝ EVERY man," it has often been observed, "has his own hobby; and it is well that it should be so, otherwise "the hobby-horse," as Hamlet says, might be "forgot," and the rider himself might get out of practice. Wisely has it therefore been ordained in the world of science, natural, mental, and moral, that each man should have his own department, in which, from his peculiar idiosyncrasy, he takes special delight, and in which, by devoting to it his time and strength, he becomes fitted to shine. One, for example, selecting the field of nature, may be seen soaring aloft in the stellar heavens, like our friend Professor Nichol, in full cry after some fugitive comet or nondescript nebula, and at once enlightening, astonishing, and delighting us with a magnificent description of some marvellously distant planet, the light of which, though kindled ages ago, reached our vision only the other day. A second may be discovered, like another learned friend, Mr Hugh Miller, as far below as the other is above us, hard at work among fossiliferous deposits, eloquently deep in ichthyolites, and dimly visible among coal measures; while a third, like Dr Johnston of Berwick, whom we are also proud to number among our friends, may very probably be found somewhere between earth and ocean, in search of those amphibious, half-living, half-vegetable substances, called zoophytes. Now, without advancing any thing like a claim to the genius and originality of the writers just mentioned, we also (if the writer of the present humble article may be allowed to borrow the editorial "we") confess to a hobby of our own, and that is, an unconquerable desire to pry into the disinterred remains of remote antiquity. We would fain explore the "unresolved nebula" of the past history of nations and churches,

*The Church in the Catacombs: A Description of the Primitive Church of Rome, illustrated by its Sepulchral Remains. By Charles Maitland, M.D. London, 1846.

Into the ancient history and original uses of the catacombs we do not now enter. Suffice it to say, that these were gloomy caverns, lying beneath the city of Rome, where the primitive Christians found a retreat from persecution, and where they were accustomed to conduct their worship and bury their dead. Being dug chiefly in the sand, with innumerable windings and entrances, capable of being opened or blocked up, and extending over the whole Campagna for miles, these labyrinths afforded an asylum to the persecuted Christians, which, though pursuit. "The catacombs," says our author, “have sometimes violated, frequently preserved them from noble witnesses to the truth. been illustrious by the actual martyrdom of some Xystus, bishop of Rome, together with Quartus, one of his clergy, sufthe First, another bishop of Rome, was traced by fered below ground in the time of Cyprian. Stephen heathen soldiers to his subterraneous chapel; on the conclusion of divine service he was thrust back into his episcopal chair [his pulpit, as we should say], and beheaded. The letters of Christians then living refer to such scenes with a simplicity that dispels all idea of exaggeration; while their expectation of sharing the same fate affords a vivid picture of those dreadful times." The idea of the gospel being preached, and its simple rites administered, in these subterranean abodes, dimly lighted by the lamp, or some furtive opening communicating with the external atmosphere, while their bloodthirsty enemies were unconsciously walking above them, is suggestive of various reflections. When we think of the fiery trials which the early Christians were called to endure, it is impossible not to recognise the fostering hand of the Saviour in thus providing so fitting a cradle for the infant community. And while the dens and caves of the earth" illustrates the indestrucspectacle of a Church existing for so many years "in tible character of Christianity, and the supernatural the mind is irresistibly led to view this subterranean of endurance with which it inspires its votaries, which, gradually increasing, were destined soon to Church in the light of a moral volcano, the fires of find a vent, and overflow the city under which they had so long burned unseen. But the most interesting feature in the catacombs to the Christian, and espe

power

cially the Protestant, antiquary, is the testimony

which they bear, in the monuments which still exist, to the primitive purity and simplicity of the Roman

Church. These monuments have, indeed, been now removed from the caverns in which they were discovered in the sixteenth century, and have been arranged chiefly at the entrance to the Vatican museum, the long corridors of which are completely lined with inscriptions plastered into the wall. "These have been collected indiscriminately from the catacombs round Rome, and have hitherto remained unpublished. To this gallery, from the circumstance of its containing little more than sepulchral stones, the name Lapidarian, or delle Lapidi, has been given. The inscriptions, amounting to more than three thousand, were arranged in their present order by Gaetano Marini. Notwithstanding the indifference manifested by the hundreds of visitors who daily traverse this corridor, there needs but little attention to invest its walls with a degree of interest scarcely to be exceeded by any other remains of past ages. 'I have spent,' says Raoul Rochette, 'many entire days in this sanctuary of antiquity. And were it only the treasure of impressions which we receive from this immense collection of Christian epitaphs, taken from the graves of the catacombs, and now attached to the walls of the Vatican, this alone would be an inexhaustible fund of recollections and enjoyment for a whole life.""

It is, of course, but a partial glance which we obtain in Dr Maitland's work of the three thousand inscriptions thus rescued from oblivion, and preserved from demolition and decay on the walls of the Vatican. But the first impression produced by the general survey here afforded, is the extreme simplicity of character, manners, and sentiments, which, judging from these memorials, marked the ancient Christians of Rome. Gathered, as we have reason to know, chiefly from the humbler ranks of society, their monuments bear evidence, in the rudeness of their style and meagreness of decoration, to the recorded fact, that "not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble," were called at that time to bear witness to Christ. Perhaps, too, the constant apprehension of detection may have prevented them from furnishing any thing more than a simple memorial of the departed, and may account for the absence generally of all information as to their relatives, designations, and other particulars. An incoherent sentence, or a straggling mis-spelt scrawl, such as Toroc Qianunc," the place of Philemon," inscribed upon a rough slab, destined to close a niche in caverns where daylight could never penetrate, tells of a persecuted, or at least oppressed, community. What can be simpler than the following?

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"This grief will always weigh upon me: may it be granted me to behold in sleep your revered countenance. My wife Albana, always chaste and modest, I grieve, deprived of your support: for our divine author gave you to me as a sacred lie in peace-in sleep-you will arise-a temporary rest is boon. You, well-deserving one, having left your relations, granted you. She lived forty-five years, five months, and thirteen days: buried in peace. Placus, her husband, made this."

The following, no doubt, refers to a Christian pastor, discovered by the emissaries of the second Antonine while praying in the catacombs. The event belongs to the fifth persecution, which began in the year 161. A number of circumstances are worthy of notice in this inscription; the beginning, which breaks out into an assurance of immortalitythe insecurity of the time-the difficulty of procuring Christian burial for the martyrs; and the concluding sentence, recalling the words of Paul, "as dying, and behold we live," and "if in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable."

"In Christ, Alexander is not dead, but lives beyond the stars, and his body rests in this tomb. He lived under the emperor Antonine, who, foreseeing that great benefit would result from his services, returned evil for good. For while on his knees, about to sacrifice to the true God, he was led away to execution. O sad times! in which sacred rites and can be more wretched than such a life? and what than such prayers, even in caverns, afford no protection to us. a death? when they could not be buried by their friends and relations. At length they sparkle in heaven. He has scarcely lived who has lived in Christian times." *

What

The pagans, in accordance with their hopeless creed, reduced the bodies of their departed friends to ashes, which were preserved in urns. The Christians, in token of their belief in the resurrection of the body, committed it entire to the earth, and paid great attention to the subject of interment. But the ceremony, which seems to have been accompanied with embalment, after the manner of the Jews, though consoling to the living, only served to prolong the decay of the dead; and time has accomplished, in the lapse of centuries, the speedier result of the fire. The following displays a tomb, cut out of the side of the sand galleries, and closed by a single slab, bearing the inscription, "Valeria sleeps in peace :"

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Dust is seen lying on the lower wall of the cell, resembling the shadow of a skeleton. "It reminds us," says our author, "of the words of Horace, 'We are but dust and a shadow.'"

The ornaments accompanying these inscriptions are, as has been already said, extremely simple, consisting chiefly of palm-leaves or olive branches, the symbols of victory and peace, or the figure of a cross, rudely scratched on the stone. The latter sign, it is certain, came into use very early in the Christian Church; but we are strongly inclined to believe that at first it was intended to represent, not the cross, but the name of Christ, just as, using the Greek X, we may now write Xtian. The following is the monogram or figure which is frequently used in these inscriptions for the words "In Christ," and which is always so rendered by our author:

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'sleeps in Christ;' another is buried with a prayer that she
may live in the Lord Jesus.' But most of all, the cross in its
simplest form is employed to testify the faith of the deceased;
and whatever ignorance may have prevailed regarding the
letter of the Holy Writ, or the more mysterious doctrines
contained in it, there seems to have been no want of appre-
hension of that sacrifice, whereby alone we obtain remission
of our sins,' and are made partakers of the kingdom of
God.' The elements of a pure faith were written with an
iron pen,
in the rock, for ever;' and if the Church of after
times had looked back to her subterranean home, to the
hole of the pit whence she was digged,' she would have
sought in vain for traces of forced celibacy, the invocation of
saints, and the representation of Deity in painting or sculp-
ture." (Pp. 14-25.)

Positive testimonies are not wanting to some of the practices of the early Christians, directly opposed to the innovations of Papal Rome. The following is sufficient to prove the marriage of the clergy::

"To Basilius the presbyter, and Felicitas his wife."

"Petronia, a Levite's wife" (Maitland translates this, a priest's wife), "the type of modesty. In this place I lay my bones. Spare your tears, dear husband and daughters, and believe that it is forbidden to weep for one who lives in God."

Such expressions as "living in God," "living in Christ," "in peace," 99 66 a sweet soul in the place of

From the resemblance this bore to the figure of the cross it came afterwards to be identified with it, and gradually, as superstition increased, it became a crucifix, the object of a stupid adoration-a charm-refreshment," "borne away by angels," "ceasing an exorcism. "The original intention," says Maitland, "of the symbol was entirely lost: from being a token of joy, crowned with flowers, a sign in which to conquer, it became a thing of tears and agony, a stock subject with the artist anxious to display his power of representing anguish."-(P. 162.) The following rude inscription proves the use of the cross to which we have now referred, in the word "Christi :".

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LANNVS XPI · MA

RTIR HIC REQVIESC

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IT SUB DIOCLISIANO
PASSUS.

Lannus, the Martyr of Christ, rests here. He suffered
under Diocletian."

But the most important purpose served by these ancient remains is the testimony which they bear to the purity of the Christian faith and practice in the age to which they refer. The allusions to Christian doctrine are, indeed, very scanty; but the strength of the argument which they furnish lies in the silence which they maintain on errors and superstitions which characterized the Church of Rome in later times.

"In general," our author remarks, "the inscriptions contained in the Lapidarian gallery, selected and arranged under Papal superintendence, there are no prayers for the dead, no addresses to the Virgin Mary, nor to the apostles or earlier saints. The distinctive character of these remains is essentially Christian; the name of Christ is repeated in an endless variety of forms; the second person of the Trinity is neither viewed in the Jewish light of a temporal Messiah, nor degraded to the Socinian estimate of a mere example, but is invested with all the honours of a Redeemer. On this subject there is no reserve. On stones innumerable appears the Good Shepherd, bearing on his shoulders the recovered sheep, by which many an illiterate believer expressed his sense of personal salvation. One

from weeping," &c., which abound in these memorials, plainly show that the notion of a purgatory had never entered into the conceptions of the primitive Christians of Rome. The practice of infant baptism is proved beyond all contradiction.

"Flavia Jovina, who lived three years and thirty days— a neophyte-in peace."

"The tile (tegula) of Candidus, the neophyte, who lived twenty-one months.'

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The baptismal rite was often performed below ground, and fonts have been discovered in some of the chapels. The earliest recorded discussion within the Church upon the subject of infant baptism, is that which occurred in the year 253, as to whether the rite should be deferred till the eighth day of the infant's life. Cyprian disavows all knowledge of any distinction between washing and sprinkling."-(Pp. 222, 223.)

On the "offices and customs of the ancient Church," the information to be gleaned from these monuments is much more unsatisfactory. On the vexed question of Church government, what is here given is so exceedingly scanty, that we fear the Episcopalian prepossessions of Dr Maitland must have prevented him from doing full justice to the subject. We do not accuse him of wilfully withholding testimonies which might have told against his favourite form of polity, but we have no doubt there are some of these which would have arrested the eye of a Presbyterian investigator, and which he, being less on the outlook for them, has failed to notice. He seems to have proceeded on the assumption, that Rome must always have had its diocesan bishop; and the following remarks, which are almost the only data on which we can form a guess at the real truth, are rather curi

ous:

"The highest office in the primitive Church of Rome was that of bishop--the Episcopus or Papa. The last title, literally signifying Father, though since become limited in its use, was originally applied to bishops in general. In all the epistles addressed to Cyprian by the Roman clergy, the Bishop of Carthage is styled, The Blessed Pope Cyprian.' The form is preserved by our Church in the words, Most Reverend Father in God.' Jerome also applies the word Papa to the head of a monastery. The title is found in an epitaph in the Lapidarian Gallery :

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