BLUEBELL AND PRIMROSE. Bluebell and primrose, sister flowers, Your native home is Eden's bowers: You are but exiles here! Blest be the breeze that blew you forth, The sun once rose in vapours furled, And gazed through clouds of dew: To pluck you from your green retreat— I love you far too well! And cheer us through life's wilderness- Southwick. THOMAS BELL. wwww THE KINGLIEST CROWN. Tho' trouble-tried and torture-torn- SONNET, TO SPENSER. Of worldly thought by over labour bred; And when the jarring h. urs have passed away, To that fair spot where still the fountains play, W. MOY THOMAS, CONSERVATISM.-0 my Conservative friends, who still specially name and struggle to approve yourselves Conservative,' would to Heaven I could persuade you of this world-old fact, than which Fate is not surer, That Truth and Justice alone are capable of being conserved' and preserved! The thing which is unjust, which is not according to God's Law, will you, in a God's Universe, try to conserve that? It is so old, say you? Yes, and the hotter haste ought you, of all others, to be in to let it grow no older! If but the faintest whisper in your hearts intimate to you that it is not fair,-hasten for the sake of Conservatism itself, to probe it rigorously, to cast it forth at once and for ever, if guilty. How will or can you preserve it, the thing that is not fair? Impossibility' a thousand fold is marked on that. And ye call yourselves Conservatives, Aristocracies :-ought not honour and nobleness of mind, if they had departed from all the Earth elsewhere, to find their last refuge with you? Ye unfortunate! The bough that is dead shall be cut away, for the sake of the tree itself. Old? Yes, it is too old.-Carlyle. LIBERTY.--To be a MAN is at all times in all countries, a title to liberty; and he who doth not assert it deserves not the name of a Man.-Major Cartwright. VOTING BY BALLOT.-The author of the law, by which votes in the Roman Senate were taken by ballot, was one Gabinius, a tribune of the people. It gave a very considerable blow to the influence of the nobility, as in this way of balloting it could not be discovered on which side the people gave their votes; and took off that restraint they before lay under, by the fear of offending their superiors.-Melmoth's Pliny. TRUE SELF-INTEREST.-They who have been so wise in their generation, as to regard only their own supposed interest at the expense and to the injury of others, shall at last find, that he who has given up all the advantages of the present world, rather than violate his conscience and the relations of life, has infinitely better provided for himself, and secured his own interest and happiness.-Bishop Butler. CRITICAL EXEGESIS OF GOSPEL HISTORY, ON THE BASIS OF STRAUSS'S LEBEN JESU.' A SERIES OF EIGHT DISCOURSES; DELIVERED AT THE LITERARY INSTITUTION, JOHN STREET, TOTTENHAM COURT ROAD, AND AT THE HALL OF SCIENCE, CITY ROAD, ON SUNDAY EVENINGS, DURING THE WINTERS OF 1848-9, AND 1849-50. III. THE MIRACLES. (Continued from last number.) THE national legends of the Jews attributed miracles of all kinds to Moses, Elijah, and others, the fore-runners of Messiah; and the believers in the Messiahship of Jesus, therefore, naturally expected miracles from him. The Four Gospels narrate numerous instances of his miraculous power; yet, two things are remarkable: first, that a couple of general notices excepted (Acts, 2 ch. 22 v. and 10 ch. 38 v.) the miracles of Jesus appear to be unknown in the preaching and epistles of the apostles, and every thing is built on the supposed fact of his resurrection: secondly, Jesus himself censures the seeking for miracles, refuses to comply with the demands for a sign, and declares that no sign shall be given to that generation but the sign of the prophet Jonas. Whether we ought on these, as well as on other accounts, to doubt the authenticity of the numerous histories of miracles in the Gospels, a close examination only can enable us to decide. 1. The Demoniacs, it was agreed, should be the first class of miracles, to which our attention should be directed. In the Fourth Gospel, be it observed, there is not one instance of this class of miracles, while in the first three Gospels the demoniacs are represented as the most frequent objects of the curative powers of Jesus. Many modern divines attempt to lessen their difficulties by contending that Jesus only complied with the prevailing notions of his time and country, while addressing himself to the cure of the demoniacs. But he so often, in his parables and general discourses, speaks of the power of evil spirits over man, as to leave us in no doubt that he really partook of the prevailing notions of his time on the subject of demoniacal possession. The Jewish view, formed after the captitivity, was that the fallen angels of Genesis (6 ch.) the souls of their offspring the giants, and of the great criminals before and after the deluge, frequently attached themselves to human souls, and inhabited human bodies. Whether this were the popular view in the time of Christ does not appear from the Gospels, where the demons are merely stated to belong to the household of Satan. The word 'lunatic' is sometimes used to denote the persons dispossessed of demons, by Christ. They are, in other words, persons whose nervous system is deranged, epileptics with sudden falls and convulsions, and maniacs whose self-consciousness is disturbed and who act with fury against themselves and others. Methods of cure, in conformity with their idea of the nature of the disease, were adopted by the Jews-for even Jesus himself is stated to admit that the Jewish exorcists worked these cures (Matth. 12 ch. 27 v.) These methods consisted of adjuration in the name of God, or of angels, with certain forms said to be derived from Solomon. Fumigations, roots, stones, and amulets, traditionally handed down as used by him, were also in use. It is not at all unlikely that these methods had a frequent curative effect in such cases: the disease really lying in the nervous system, by exciting a belief in the patient that the demon could not retain his hold before a form of conjuration, it might often effect the cure of the disorder. But we read of Jesus that without conjuration by any other power, and without the appliance of any further means, he expelled the demons by his word. Three of these cases are especially remarkable. (1.) The cure of a demoniac in the synagogue of Capernaum, has the position of the earliest miracle performed by Jesus, in Mark (1 ch. 21 v.) and Luke (4 ch. 31 v.); while in the Fourth Gospel, the conversion of water into wine is stated to be "the first miracle that Jesus did." In the synagogue of Capernaum, Jesus produces a deep impression by his teaching-a demoniac cries out, in the character of a demon possessing him, that he will have nothing to do with him, and that he knows Jesus to be the Messiah who has come to destroy them, i. e. the demons - Jesus commands the demon to hold his peace and come out of the man, which happens amidst cries and convulsions, and to the great astonishment of the people at the power displayed by Jesus. Such is the relation. But who gives it? We do not know—for we have no clear evidence as to the writers of the account. What is an "unclean devil"? (Luke 4 ch. 33 v.) How can one spirit, or distinct intelligent existence, take possession of, or absorb the consciousness of another? "And when the devil had thrown him in the midst, he came out of him, and hurt him not." (Luke 4 ch. 35 v.) How could "the devil throw him in the midst "? How did the observers distinguish “the devil" before he came out, so as to know that it was he who was so throwing the man? How did "the devil" come out of him? What came out of him? Of what colour, size, shape, was it? If spirits cannot be seen, how did the spectators know that the devil “ came out of him "? Let any orthodox believer who may be present answer these questions. Will any answer? All are silent! And if all the doctors in divinity in Christendom were present, they would be in the like predicament. And let none be offended because these questions are asked. Remember, we are told that our salvation depends on a belief in a revelation which is affirmed to be attested by these miracles. But what rational man in this nineteenth century can conclude he has any evidence for a miracle here? If the miracle proves the revelation-what proves the miracle? If we are allowed to consider the narratives as wanting in correctness when they appear to present this cure as occurring early in Christ's ministry, it is not improbable that an epileptic may have been impressed with the wide-spread fame of Jesus and his powerful discourse in the synagogue, until he imagined him to be the Messiah ;-Jesus, in whom the great conception of his own Messiahship was growing, may have spoken to him ;the words may have influenced the poor patient and produced in his nervous frame, at first greater convulsions, (" And when the unclean spirit had torn him, and cried with a loud voice -Mark, 1 ch. 26 v.)—until, in his prostrate and exhausted condition, (" thrown him in the midst ") the bystanders concluded that he was delivered; or, a lucid interval, and greater or less relief may have succeeded. But the permanence of the cure? What testimony is there of that? The writers of the Gospels, whoever they were, may have related this as a cure, together with many others, simply because nothing was known either of the after-health or relapse of the epileptic. Of all the cures ascribed to Christ, however, the relief of persons afflicted with nervous disorders of the less rooted kind, appear to be the most probable and historical. But these are by no means miracles. Nor, although they depicture Jesus as one yearning over the miseries of mankind, and endeavouring to relieve them, do they enhance our conceptions of his mental superiority, inasmuch as they shew him to have merely received the current mistaken notions of his countrymen with regard to demoniacal possession. Ten thousand such stories could not exalt him in our estimation to the height at which he stands by his sublime moral teaching. (2.) Another cure of a demoniac is related by Matthew, (17 ch. 14 v.) Mark, (9 ch. 14 7.) and Luke (9 ch. 37 v.) It is that of a boy, whom the disciples could not cure, and occurs on the descent from the Mount of Transfiguration. Legendary variations are met at the very opening of the story. In Matthew, Jesus having descended from the mountain, appears to join the multitude by accident; in Luke, the multitude come to meet Jesus; and in Mark, the multitude run towards him to salute him. This last evangelist, in whom the dramatic tendency will be frequently observed, though not always to the most sensible embellishment of his story, adds, "And straightway all the people, when they saw him, were greatly amazed"! --though what there was in the arrival of Jesus to amaze the multitude, he does not say. Matthew describes the boy as one who was lunatic; and, indeed, the reference of periodical disorders to the influence of the moon was as common in the time of Christ, and in Palestine, as it has been in our own country at past periods. In Mark, Jesus addresses the supposed demon as a "dumb and deaf spirit" so that the inarticulate sounds uttered by epileptics in their fits, seem to have been regarded as the dumbness of the demon, and their incapability of noticing any words addressed to them, as the demon's deafness. : At the close of the narrative in Matthew, Jesus ascribes the impotence of his disciples to their deficient faith: Luke omits this; and Mark not only does so, but, interweaves, after his peculiar dramatic style, a by-scene between Jesus and the boy's father; in which an enlarged description of the boy's malady is given,-Jesus puts the tentative sentence "If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth," and "straightway the father" cries out with tears-Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief" These are divergencies which mark, still more, the legendary origin of this narrative. And if Mark's adornment of the story could be depended on, it would awaken in us a suspicion that Jesus was by no means confident of his power to cure. Paley says of the Miracles-“ were not secret, nor momentary, nor tentative, nor ambiguous." Did we find the first of these narratives about demoniacs free from ambiguity? The word "tentative" signifies something done by way of attempt, trial, or experiment. Would not the words which Mark here puts into the mouth of Christ, "If thou canst believe me," &c. betoken the desire to attempt, companied with a want of full confidence in his own power to cure? They Let no one suppose that this is an insinuation against the moral excellence of Christ. I mean no such thing. But I desire, above all things, to look into the heart of that young man of Nazareth, so far as the imperfect light of the Gospels enables us to see its inner workings: to behold him struggling with the great enthusiastic conception of his own Messiahship-sometimes feeling less confident of it-and feeling his way towards external proofs of it. I think the Gospels assist us, in some degree, to do this; but amidst their legendary divergencies we cannot always be sure that we have found the right key to the actual experience of the mind and heart of Jesus of Nazareth. 66 Mark seeks to make the scene more effective by other additions; he tells us that the people ran together that they might observe what was passing, that after the expulsion of the demon the boy was, as one dead, insomuch that many said, he is dead ;" but that Jesus, taking him by the hand, lifted him up, and he arose. In conclusion,-Luke dismisses the narrative with a brief notice of the astonishment of the people; but Matthew and Mark pursue the subject by making the disciples, when alone with Jesus, ask him why they were not able to cast out the demon. In Mark, Christ's answer is "This kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting"--but Matthew adds these words of Christ after a short discourse on unbelief, and the power of faith. The divergencies here are especially worth notice, since they unfold to us how the real sayings of Christ-whether consisting of figures, in the Oriental style, or striking moral maxims-were borne down on the stream of tradition, and attached, in the lapse of time, and by transmission into various localities, sometimes to one part of his supposed history, and sometimes to another. The words of Matthew (17 ch. 20 v.) Because of your unbelief," are neither in Mark nor Luke: Matthew's words "If ye have faith as a grain of mustardseed, &c" (same verse) attached to this narrative of the demoniac are, by Luke, given as a short stray fragment (17 ch. 6 v.) unconnected with any narrative of a miracle, and with the variation of a "sycamine tree" instead of a "mountain": Mark gives the sentence on the faith which removes mountains as the moral of the history of the cursed fig-tree, where Matthew also has it a second time: there, however, it is totally out of place, as we shall see when we come to that narrative. Thus we are left without positive knowledge of the occasion on which this figurative saying of Jesus was really uttered. (3). The cure of the possessed Gadarenes, (or Gergesenes) is, for several reasons, the most startling of all these stories of demoniacal possession,-for, in this instance, we have not only several divergencies of the evangelists, (Matt. 8 ch. 28 v., Mark, 5 ch. 1 v., Luke, 8 ch. 26 v.) but many demons instead of one, and their entrance into the herd of swine-(so often felt to be a scandal by divines!)—instead of a simple departure of a demon from the human body. 66 After a stormy passage across the sea of Galilee to its eastern shore, Jesus meets (according to Mark and Luke) a demoniac who lived among the tombs, and was subject to outbreaks of terrific fury against himself, and others. But, according to Matthew, there were two possessed with devils." Harmonists have resorted to many expedients in order to get rid of the difficulty here; but without success. It is not simply a question of number, for Matthew's idea of a plurality of demons is evidently grounded on his 'fact' of a plurality of men. He says nothing about the demons being 'Legion'—and his narrative simply reads as if each man were possessed with a devil: any one reading his narrative, by itself, could have no other understanding of it. It is no reply, then, to tell us that 'Matthew's two includes the one of Mark and Luke. The harmonists would render us a better service by endeavouring to discover for us, whether Matthew's mention of a plurality of men gave rise to the idea of a vast plurality of demons, and so this idea became incorporated in two later Gospels, or, whether the Gospel named after Matthew be later than that named after Luke, and the writer of our first Gospel being less credulous, in this particular, than the writer of the third, rejected his 'Legion' story, and reduced the number of the demons to two, giving them, at the same time, just so many human bodies to tenant. But the 'harmonists' leave us without harmonizing the difficulty: this is the first discrepancy, then, in this narrative. The uncalculating nature of legend is always apparent. The demoniacs are made to recognise Jesus at once as the Messiah; but how they could have learnt that he had any such reputation seems impossible-since they are represented as so exceeding fierce" that no one could come near them! Again: in Matthew, the demoniac, stricken with terror, deprecates the unwelcome approach of Jesus; in Luke, he addresses Jesus, when arrived, as a suppliant ; in Mark, he eagerly runs to meet Jesus, while yet at a distance. But our |