Imagens da página
PDF
ePub

"110. Pro egentibus Presbyteris, lib. 1. Sunt causæ quæ urgeant pauperiores. This tract is likewise in the same collection" [i. e. in C. C. C., Cambridge,] "with this title,' Why poor Priests have no Benefice,' and beginning thus, Some causes menen some poor Priests to receive not Benefices.' (P. 199.)

[ocr errors]

If he had himself published this tract, it is not likely that he would have omitted all mention of the fact; but perhaps, as I said before, some of your readers will be able to explain this difficulty. Lewis might have printed it since the publication of his life of Wycliffe, although I have not seen any account of his having done so, except in Mr. Vaughan's statement.

In Sect. III., which contains a list of the Wycliffe MSS. in the imperial library at Vienna, there are about eighteen or twenty pieces (if I have counted right), and in Sect. IV., perhaps about six more, at most, which I could not discover in Mr. Lewis's list; but, on the whole, I have counted about one hundred articles in Lewis, of which no notice whatsoever has been taken by Mr. Vaughan. These facts will enable us to judge of Mr. Vaughan's pretensions to a more complete knowledge of Wycliffe's writings than had been obtained by any of his former biographers.

I shall notice one other point before I conclude. In the Appendix to Vol. II., (note, p. 425,) Mr. Vaughan says:

"Several of the papers in this and the preceding appendix have been printed from Mr. Lewis's collection, and it will be seen that I have generally retained his emendations."

The word "several'' is here used, I think, in rather an uncommon signification, for, upon referring to Mr. Lewis's collection, I find that in the appendix to Mr. Vaughan's second volume EVERY paper is reprinted from Lewis, unless we consider it as an exception that in the case of two of them (No. II. and No. III.), some paragraphs at the end of the documents given by Lewis have been omitted. I find also that in the appendix to Vol. I. there is but one paper (viz. No. I.) which does not appear in Lewis's collection; and as to Mr. Vaughan's having retained his predecessor's emendations in these documents, it may easily be understood, from what has been said, that he had good reasons for so doing.

In my next letter, I hope to give an account of a very remarkable volume, preserved in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, which contains many of the reformer's most celebrated pieces, and one tract, which is supposed to be unique. It is a volume interesting on many accounts, and especially as having been the innocent cause of leading certain biographers of Wycliffe into mistakes. But of this more hereafter. I am, sir, your obedient servant, T.

P.S. Since writing the above I have found the authority+ upon which Mr. Vaughan has ascribed the publication of the tract "Why

It should be noted also, that of these omissions, Mr. Vaughan gives his readers no intimation whatsoever; they can only be discovered by comparing the documents with Lewis's collection.

+ See Mr. Baber's Memoirs of Wiclif, prefixed to his edit. of Wiclif's New Tes tament, p. li.

[ocr errors]

poor priests have no benefice" to Mr. Lewis, and I find also that Mr. Lewis really did publish it. It is necessary, therefore, to explain how my difficulty about the matter was occasioned. The edition of Lewis's life of Wiclif used by Mr. Vaughan, and which I also had in my hands, was the Oxford Ed. of 1820; it was printed from a copy corrected by the venerable minister of Meregate himself, and it did not occur to me, therefore, until I saw Mr. Baber's reference to the first edit. of 1720, that any document, such as the tract in question, was actually omitted in this improved and corrected reprint. I now find, however, that, in the first edition, the author printed that treatise from the Cambridge MS. in his Appendix, No. 19, and that the document itself, as well as the reference to it in the text,* is wholly omitted by the Oxford editor. No doubt this was done on the authority of the author himself in the copy from which the edition of 1820 was printed, and as no notice is taken of the omission, it was probably his intention, had he lived to complete his design, to have introduced it in some other place. I have no means of ascertaining whether this omission occurs in the second edition of Lewis's work, which was printed, I believe, in the year 1723.

I may here mention that the references to the collection in the Oxford edit. are, at least in the first two chapters, incorrect, the numbers being retained as they stood in the edition of 1720-thus in p. 6, "Coll. No. 7" refers to the document which was No. 7 in the first edition, but in the Oxford edition it is No. 10; and, in like manner, at p. 12, "Coll. No. 5" should be Coll. No. 7. In p. 13, "Coll. No. 4" should be Coll. No. 6. In p. 25, "Coll. No. 22" should be Coll. No. 29. This oversight appears to have been corrected in the rest of the work.

T.

VAUGHAN'S LIFE OF WYCLIFFE.

SIR,-It was not until a few days since that I had any knowledge of the paper in your February Number in which your correspondent "T.," of Dublin, professes to expose an inaccuracy in my "Life of Wycliffe," and informs your readers that this is only a specimen from a number of similar misrepresentations of the reformer's meaning which his reference to the Wycliffe MSS. in Trinity College, Dublin,

has enabled him to detect.

I appeal to your sense of justice for permission to state, that if the author of that paper will complete his series of exposures, and attach his name to the production, I pledge myself to a reply. I mean this as a challenge to your correspondent "T." I venture to affirm he will not accept it. Should he do so, I would suggest, that his reputation will be served by avoiding the somewhat stale usage of giving part of an author's premises in the place of the whole.

Kensington, March 16th.

I am, sir, yours &c., ROBERT VAUGHAN.

* First Edit., p. 100. Oxf. Edit., p. 122.

THE NOACHIC CREATION.

SIR,-In a former paper, on "The Adamic Creation," I endeavoured to shew that the races of animals described in the second chapter of Genesis were of a useful and domestic kind, and constituted a subsequent and totally distinct creation from those mentioned in the first chapter, which, on the contrary, were of a wild nature, and roamed the earth at large; and that, consequently, it was only the tame and useful animals which the Lord brought unto Adam and shut up with him in Paradise. This distinction I founded on the difference of expression, "the beasts of the earth" and "the beasts of the field" or pasture. It occurred to me afterwards, if this interpretation of the beasts of the earth was at all founded in truth, that it would bear the test of being applied to the scriptural account of the deluge, as compared with the statements of geology. The investigation of that portion of Genesis, with reference to the beasts of the earth, has led me to the conclusion that only the harmless and useful animals were brought by God unto Noah and shut up with him in the ark; consequently, that all the strange and carnivorous races became extinct at the flood, and that our present animals of this kind are a postdiluvian creation.

The animals that went into the ark are repeatedly mentioned, and are variously classified; yet, it is observable, that there is a studied silence concerning the beasts of the earth; on Noah's landing, however, we find immediate mention of them, which leads me to suppose that they were a new creation, together with the olive branch which the dove brought back into the ark.

The creatures that were to accompany Noah are thus first mentioned: "Of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee: they shall be male and female. (The sorts are then specified.) Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every sort shall come unto thee to keep them alive." They are afterwards classified differently: "Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female; and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female; of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the female, to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth." By unclean beasts I understand such domestic animals as were unfit for sacrifice, but yet useful to man, as the horse, &c. We have no express mention of the beasts of the earth by name, until after the retreating of the waters. "And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth; and the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered." Again: "And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you; and with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from every creature that went out of the ark down to every beast of the earth" (that went not out of the ark). In the eight chapter, the

animals that came out of the ark are particularly specified, but no mention is made of beasts of the earth; their sudden appearance immediately afterwards seems to be utterly inexplicable, except on the supposition of a new creation.

Some authors, as Professor Ure, in his system of Geology, have supposed that many powerful and ferocious animals were providentially allowed to perish at the time of the deluge, as inconsistent with the more general dispersion of mankind, and contracted supply of food and herbage after the flood; but I have not met with any one who has maintained from Scripture the total extinction of every living creature of all flesh, with the exception of some harmless and useful animals that were preserved with Noah. This exclusion of the wild beasts must greatly modify our calculations concerning the capacity of the ark; and it removes, more effectually than any other way, the great difficulty of supplying the carnivorous animals with food. Your Correspondent S. E. V. T., indeed, in controverting my opinion on the Rainbow, (Vol. III. p. 667,) supports the notion that the Almighty laid a restraint during that period upon their natural appetite; but, if the interposition of the Deity is at all brought forward, the most simple and complete case is that of a new creation; and this view is both compatible with the scriptural account, and is actually required by the discoveries of geology.

- Cuvier gives the following account of the antediluvian races of animals "We no longer meet with palæotheria, anoplotheria, or any of this peculiar genus. The pachydermata, however, are still found there; the mammoth, mastodon, elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, accompanied by innumerable horses, and many large ruminantia. Carnivora of the size of lions, tigers, and hyenas, desolated the new animal kingdom. Its general character, even in the extreme north and on the banks of the icy sea, was similar to that now only presented by the torrid zone; and yet there was no species exactly similar to those of the present day. .... Whatever resemblance certain species of the present day offer to them, it cannot be disputed that the total of this (the antediluvian) population had an entirely distinct character, and that the majority of the races which composed it have been annihilated." (On the Revolutions of the Surface of the Globe, sub fin.) In another passage he states the exceptions, which confirm my commentary in a very remarkable manner :-"The genus of the horse also existed at this period, but it is impossible to say whether it was or was not of the same species as that now existing, because the skeletons of this species so much resemble each other, that they cannot be determined from isolated fragments. The same doubt exists with respect to the bones of deer and oxen which are found in the same diluvial depositories with the pachydermata, and are consequently of the same age; but there is yet much difficulty in deciding how they differ from the present breeds of similar animals."-Now horses, deer, and oxen, are some of the very animals which we might expect Noah would take with him into the ark; and these are among the few kinds which geology represents as common to the two worlds.

The account which has been given of the animals that were brought

into existence at the time of Adam and Noah, and which involves the principle of successive creations, will serve to throw some light on the six days or successive acts of creation; but this subject I shall reserve for another communication.

Keysoe Vicarage, Beds.

W. B. WINNING.

CHARACTER OF PONTIUS PILATE.

SIR,-I am glad that your correspondent "Prytanis" agrees in my exposition of John, xix. 11, (the only one which, as I believe, the Greek language permits it to bear,) but I would fain submit to his reconsideration the new, and to me astonishing, sense which he attaches to its words in another respect. Pilate, being judge, reminded his prisoner of the power he possessed as such, without the slightest intention of disputing the origin of all power, but merely in order to recal to a due sense of his authority the personage whom, from his "giving him no answer," he actually thought to be wanting in that due sense. Our Lord replied, "Thou couldest have no power at all over ME, were it not given thee from above, which aggravates the sin of him who delivered me unto thee." Assuredly, the Lord did not here simply intend to say, that all Pilate's magisterial power was derived, like his life and health, from the dispensing providence of God. He meant to say, that neither kings nor magistrates, angels, principalities, or powers in heaven or earth could exercise authority over the only begotten Son of God, except it were especially given them by the Father. Otherwise, every man accused before any tribunal, in any age, might use the same words with equal propriety. But Christ was of a nature amenable to no power, although obedient and condescending to it, that all righteousness might be fulfilled. This the Roman knew not, nor could comprehend the hard sayings that met his ear; but to the betrayer of the Lord, the Lord had revealed himself, and had made him one of the chosen depositaries and dispensers of the truth which all nations were to hear. Therefore, and therefore only, was the sin of treachery and murder aggravated into sacrilege in him, who was not of those who "knew not what they did." In short, in John xix. 11, the emphasis is manifestly on "me. Allow me a few more words on points that may further illustrate the topic which I began to moot. Thou sayest or hast said are affirmatives in the New Testament idiom, and signify it is even so. But the same cannot be said of the words "Thou sayest that I am a king;" and it appears yet stronger in the Greek words συ λέγεις ότι βασιλευς eiju 'ET. (John xviii. 37.) This is clear assertion of fact, and of a fact not appearing there or any where. Quid agimus, what shall we do in this difficulty? The very question gives the answer. As in agimus, so in λeyes, the present stands for the speedy future, to be for to be about to ; as in μικρον και οὐ θεωρειτε με and ούκετι πιω ἐκ τῆς ἀμπελου ws, &c. We must interpret it, " thou thyself shalt say that I am a

2

* But wish to be informed, being little of a scholar.

« AnteriorContinuar »