The Electra furnishes the best example, in the Greek drama, of that perfect adaptation of punishment to crime, which is called "poetic justice." Of course, this nice adjustment is not often seen, in the distribution of rewards and punishments in real life. Yet there are not wanting examples, both in secular and sacred history, which suffice to show that the principle, which so commends itself to the aesthetic and the moral nature of man, is recognized in the providence and government of God, and so constitute a presumptive argument from analogy, answering to the intuitive convictions of the human soul, that this principle will be fully carried out in the retributions of the life to come.

The same tragedy which develops the doctrine of retributive justice, in a manner so congenial to the aesthetic and the ethical nature of man, contains also a distinct recognition of another principle deeply rooted in the human soul: the principle of expiatory and vicarious sacrifices of one human being as a substitute and a satisfaction for the sins of others.

Artemis is offended by the slaying of a stag in her sacred grove, or rather by some boastful words uttered by Agamemnon when he slew it (569). Adverse winds detain the Grecian fleet, in port at Aulis, and they can neither set sail for Troy, nor return home, till they have propitiated the goddess. This propitiation, as they are instructed by the voice of oracle or seer, can be effected only by the sacrifice of Agamemnon's daughter, as a compensation (avrioтadμov, 571) for the slain stag. The father resisted and, for a time, refused to offer the sacrifice. But there was no other means of escape (Xúσis, 573) from the anger of the goddess and the winds that imprisoned them in the harbor. At length, though much against his will (BiaoDels Tolá), he yielded. The unwilling victim was brought and sacrificed. The angry goddess was appeased; the ad

1 Herodotus's history of the Persian wars, and, indeed, his whole history, is a great prose drama, written to illustrate the same moral as that of the book of Esther and the history of the Old Testament generally. That moral, stated generally, is Providence, and specifically it is the doctrine of a divine Nemesis in human affairs.

2 According to Euripides (Iph. in Taur.) and some other authorities, Iphige

verse winds became favorable, and the host set sail for Troy. The mother treasured up in her memory the dreadful sacrifice, and, many years after, alleged this rending of her affections in justification of her crimes. She argues that Agamemnon had no right to offer her daughter to make satisfaction for the Greeks ('Apyelov xápiv tivwv, 534), nor instead of Menelaus his brother (ἀντ ̓ ἀδελφοῦ Μενέλεω, 537), on whose account the voyage was undertaken. The pure-minded, earnest Electra justifies her father on the ground of unavoidable necessity, and casts the blame, if blame there be, on the goddess, who demanded the sacrifice, saying: Ask the huntress Artemis, as a satisfaction for what (Tivos Towns, 564) she restrained the favoring winds at Aulis? Reason about the justice of it as we may, men have never been able to get rid of the idea of expiatory and vicarious sacrifice. History, Grecian, Roman, and barbarian, is full of it. In one form or another, it pervades or underlies all religions, be they Pagan, Mohammedan, Jewish, or Christian. And the law of vicarious sacrifice is almost universal in nature. Throughout the mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms, the higher organizations and forms of life are nourished by the destruction or decay of the lower. Life springs from death, and the nation is saved, the race is rescued and reclaimed, the species is propagated, multiplied and improved, by the sacrifice of the individual. The corn

of wheat must fall into the ground and die, before it can bear much fruit. But it is only in the gospel of Christ that we see the great propitiatory sacrifice for a sinful race provided by the holy love of the universal Father, made by the willing and joyful obedience of the Son of Man; who is, at the same time, the Son of God; and accepted, with admiring and adoring gratitude, by believing souls, as a necessary "satisfaction for the ethical nature of both God and man.”

nia was rescued by the goddess herself, when on the point of being sacrificed, and conveyed in a cloud to Tauris, where she became the priestess of Artemis ; while a stag (or, as others say, some other victim) was offered in her stead, thus bearing a striking resemblance to the sacrifice of Isaac as related in the book of Genesis. But Sophocles makes Electra say in so many words that Agamemnon sacrificed her (éðvσev avтìv, 576).

[To be concluded.]

ARTICLE VI.

THE APOSTLE PAUL, A WITNESS FOR THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS.

BY PROF. GEORGE P. FISHER, YALE college.

WE propose to prove by the testimony of the Apostle Paul- by testimony which all admit to be his-that the apostles who attended Jesus during his life, bore witness to his resurrection very soon after that event is alleged to have occurred. The resurrection of Christ is the great miracle of Christianity, by which the divine mission of its founder is demonstrated.1 Once establish this fact by irrefragable proof, and the other miracles of scripture are easy of credence; nay, they seem to be demanded. Such a transaction cannot stand by itself. There must go before it supernatural preparations. It is not a stray and solitary boulder cast upon the earth, but the key-stone of a mighty arch. Grant the Saviour's resurrection, and the Old Testament dispensation, with its series of divine interpositions, can be easily defended. Christianity, as a historical religion, is placed high above the reach of successful assault.

The attacks which have been made upon the genuineness of the books which compose the New Testament canon, have imposed the necessity of a new line of defence. Pantheism leaves no room for a miracle. Under that scheme of philosophy there is no personal Being whose will can interrupt the uniform course of nature; and hence the miracle is utterly precluded. The devotee of pantheism, when he comes on the ground of historical inquiry, is obliged by his creed to deny the supernatural, in the proper sense of that term, wherever it appears; and to find a naturalistic solution of the phenomena on which belief in the supernatural has been founded. Strauss, starting with his Hegelian premises,

See Romans 1:4, et al.

endeavored to eliminate the supernatural from the gospel histories, by turning the miracles into myths emanating by degrees from the imagination of the early church, as it brooded over the Master's life and tragic fate, and unconsciously wove into his career events to correspond with the Old Testament description of the Messiah. Strauss had little to say of the book of Acts, which purports to be the production of a contemporary; and still less of the apostolic epistles. Even on the authorship of the gospels, and of the fourth gospel in particular, he was vacillating. He, therefore, left the greater part of his destructive work to be done by others. A systematic theory concerning the origin of Christianity and the New Testament writings, was imperatively required in order to carry out and support the speculations of Strauss. This has been attempted by the abler and more thoroughly learned men of the Tübingen school, of whom Baur stands at the head. It is no part of our present plan, to describe at length the views of this formidable antagonist of revealed religion. We simply need to say, that, while he does not scruple to impugn the credibility of the book of Acts, and even charges the author with intentional untruth-thus forsaking the mythical theory for the older infidelity, the rationalismus vulgaris — he fully admits the genuineness of the four Pauline epistles, the Epistle to the Romans, that to the Galatians, and the two Epistles to the Corinthians. These, according to Baur, were written by Paul, and exhibit Christianity according to his conception of it, in contrast with the Judaizing ideas of Peter and the church at Jerusalem.

It is our belief that in these writings, whose genuineness is not disputed by the Tübingen sceptics-the Apocalypse. and a part of Matthew should be added to complete the list - there is contained abundant and irrefutable proof of the supernatural facts of Christianity; that, on the basis of these Pauline epistles, the mythical hypothesis can be shown to be impossible and without foundation; and when it is once discovered that nothing is gained by casting the historical books and so many of the Epistles out of the canon, but that

the supernatural origin of Christianity remains untouched, the attempt is very likely to be abandoned.

In this Article we undertake to show that the apostles, Peter, James, and the others, testified at once to the resurrection of Christ, and that hence the supposition of a slowly growing myth is absurd; and this we shall do from certain statements in these Pauline epistles.

Before we pursue our special topic, however, we desire to offer a few remarks on the conversion of the Apostle Paul, and the bearing of this event on Christian evidences. Baur and Zeller do not scruple to pronounce the narrative in Acts unhistorical, and to make its motive the desire of Luke to place Paul on a level with Peter, and to give the former a full and legitimate title to the apostolic office. This notion is a part of the offensive and untenable theory concerning the design of the entire book, and is mere conjecture. The narrative, however, has always been exposed to sceptical objections of another kind. It is possible to say, and it has often been said, that the transaction was in the excited soul of the traveller to Damascus, and that the light and voice from heaven were only subjectively real. Instances are not wanting of sudden conversion, of a revolution of opinion and feeling, accomplished apparently in a moment, though in fact it had long been prepared for. In numerous cases, optical wonders have attended the change, which, though seemingly real, are known to be the product of imagination. Not to recall the lives of the Roman Catholic saints, all who have read the conversion of Col. Gardiner, will remember that he beheld, as he supposed, the face and person of Jesus. The infuriated Saul, it is said, had begun to be agitated by misgivings. Recollections of Gamaliel and his moderate teachings, of Stephen and his uplifted face and dying prayer, haunted him. At length, while on the journey to Damascus, his doubts became convictions, and a terrible distress of conscience ensued. Having in mind what he had heard of the exaltation and glory of Christ, he felt its truth. On a sudden, the sky is overcast; perhaps a thunderbolt falls near him, and the lightning flashes on his pathway. In his terror