receive our Lord's testimony as that of God, seeing God and Son "both agree?" Again M'Donald says, "Unitarian controversy has dwindled into a little thing. But Christian Unitarians believe that Christ was the Son of God, but not 'God the Son." He says his class has done much for England. Echo eries, Where? If so, that is, if Christ was "the Son of God,"—and hence inspired,—and if He spoke "in agreement with God as one who held the unity of God's truth," why do Hennell, M'Donald, and yourself not believe Him? Christ said he gave his life for the world, &c.; His expiatory sacrifice was thus necessary, otherwise God could not possibly be merciful and at the same time be just. It was "impossible," therefore, that the cup should pass from Him, and redemption follow. Hence He said to the Father, "Not my will, but thine be done." "This is the will of God, that every one who seeth the Son, and believeth on Him, shall have everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day." Again, was it not in agreement with God's truth that the Baptist John had declared Jesus to be the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world? Why all these, and numerous other similar passages, if there be no vicarious sacrifice? But Jesus said more. He expressly said he was God. "Before Abraham was, I AM." "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." "I and the Father are one." 'He that hath seen me hath seen Him that sent me." "If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also; and from henceforth ye know Him, and have SEEN HIM." Hence Paul said, "God was in Christ, not imputing to men their trespasses," &c. Thus these sceptics, so impiously calling themselves Christians, contradict their own position, and falsify their own avowed principles. They do not act up to them even to the extent of their own admissions. Hennell says Jesus was an impostor, a seditious person, and an enthusiast, and yet these men say Jesus was a good man, even the greatest and best of men- "God's Son!" Speaking of the clergy, M'Donald concludes, "When will the clerical body cease to be stirring up the fires of animosity, and sending the bitter waters of sectarian dissension over the face of society? when will they apply themselves to teach human duties (none to God !), instead of retailing and wrangling about old creeds, and taking truth for their authority (what is truth?), rather than always childishly hunting after authority for their truth, and all unite to feed this mighty people of England with a daily bread of growing knowledge and quiet goodness, and all proclaim that old religion which was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, viz., to be good, and to do good?" Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? GEORGE COMBE, Esq. Edinburgh, April 4, 1857. Dear Sir, I return your newspaper, containing Mr M'Donald's lecture, with thanks. (See Notes.) I do not know what Mr M'Donald's belief is. If he nullifies the Bible, he surely is wrong in calling himself a Christian-taking a name which Hennell and he (as I suppose) stigmatizes as that of an 'impostor, a seditious person, and an enthusiast." And yet, says Hennell," this Galilean was a good man, unparalleled in the history of the world." If God in times past spake not to the fathers by the prophets, and in the last days by His Son from heaven, my original question is still unanswered, and it will not do for Mr M'Donald to say, "Let all unite to feed this mighty people of England with a daily bread of growing knowledge and quiet goodness, and all proclaim that old religion which was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, viz., to be good, and to do good.' Man is neither good, nor knows how to become good, for, as Seneca truly said, "Man is prepossessed, he is evil before he becomes good, he must unlearn his vices." Man is a moral, and hence an accountable being. His conscience tells him this. He feels it; but how he is to be made good he finds not. The question I submitted to you is thus left unanswered, and I fear it is one which is unanswerable, unless we accept Scripture, with all its alleged imperfections, as a solution of the difficulty. I assure you I await your publication with deep interest. I am, yours faithfully, ROBERT DEUCHAR. A friend of Mr Combe, by his desire, delivered to me a complete copy of M'Donald's lecture. I wrote for, and received from Dr H. M'Neill, a copy of his published address. His grounds for refusing to meet this vulgar sceptic on a public platform were just what any one possessed of self-respect and love for "the truth" would justify. On perusing M'Donald's lecture, I found it to be merely a plagiarism from Hennell's learned work. It, however, led me to reperuse Seneca and Hennell, and to compare them with the Bible. As many of my readers have not access to Seneca's books, I may add that Seneca cannot be read without great interest, and even instruction. Calvin said he read Seneca next to the Bible. It was from him he borrowed his idea of fatal necessity. Calvinistic heresy was the ruin of Mr Combe, and many others as great as he. The late Dr John Brown read Seneca while on his death-bed. And no marvel after all. That Mr Combe's letters were, on reflection, considered by him of importance, must be evident from the fact, that one of his particular friends made a singular attempt to get the originals out of my hands. R. D. Mr Combe's Essay soon after made its appearance. I immediately sent a copy of the preceding letters to Dr Candlish, stating my objections to Mr Combe's definition of "Natural laws," with a request that he would, for the interests of Christianity, publish a Refutation. Dr Candlish thanked me for my communication, and at the same time said that the letters were exceedingly interesting. I can now see the reason for the Doctor's declinature. Dr Candlish is a high Calvinist, and it would have been no easy matter for him to refute the great Wesley. I, however, made a feeble attempt to expose the palpable fallacy on which Mr Combe's new theory is founded; but, distrusting my own ability, I delayed for a long time to send my letter after it had been written, and Mr Combe's death, which took place in England, soon followed. I give my letter for what it is worth. GEORGE COMBE, Esq. It Dear Sir, I have perused your Essay on the Relation betwixt Science and Religion with due attention; but, as you anticipated, I freely confess that it has "only given me pain." Your" Constitution of Man" was once a world's wonder. gained nearly universal applause. I never was a worshipper of George Combe. You were fully aware of this when I refused to vote for you as a candidate to fill the highest chair in our farfamed university. I denounced you then at the Council Board. I said you were a sceptic, although your testimonials from men of high renown were in my hand. They formed a volume of no mean size. Your last essay has confirmed the opinion I then expressed. It shews that your " Constitution of Man" was only a prelude to a more vigorous attack on the records of eternal truth. For even then you had launched your phrenologic bark on that unfathomable and boundless abyss-on which even the great Newton feared to adventure-without helm and compass. No marvel that, in the darkest nights of scepticism, your gallant ship became a total wreck, and that yourself, its helmsman, have failed to reach that haven of eternal truth, where the fair sisters of charity, whom you seem so ardently to love, and so sincerely to seek after, are only to be found at home. It is the haven where, without price, you might then have bought, and even yet may buy, eternal joy and "peace." If I had found that peace, you bade me hold it." fast." You have not found it is more clear; for death, you say, is an eternal sleep. Your "last sheet-anchor" bears on its stamp the name of "hope." But what is the value of a name when hope itself is lost? PHRENOLOGY. I would not that you should think me an opponent of Gall. I hold that phrenology has truth for its basis; but it, as a science, like mesmerism, is still in its infancy. I firmly believe that phrenology will yet supply the place of our present inane science miscalled Philosophy. But while I so far follow Gall, I must confess I have not learnt from you to swallow wormwood without "pain." Your essay is nought but Gall and wormwood, ingeniously intermixed. There is rank poison in your golden cup, by which you only seem to mutter and peep, but never to divine. You have, you say, discovered a new and glorious light. Materialistic phrenology is with you the only royal road to knowledge; for even mesmeric truth you have positively ignored. You seem also to have imagined that the great mass of philosophers who preceded your illustrious advent had, by some fatal mistake, shunted themselves off the straight line of truth on to the slanting line of error, and you, as an experienced shipwrecked helmsman, have imagined that you might assume, pro tempore, the office of pointsman, that you might authoritatively command the erring conductor of the royal carriage to back his engine, and thereby enable you to shunt it on to your new interminable line, which you foolishly say will ultimately lead to one grant result―annihilation is its name. Yet still you vainly think that your philosophy is so good, that it will, if accepted, benefit even generations yet unborn. At present you add, it hath not hitherto entered into the heart of man to conceive what great things you have prepared for them that follow your groundless Scheme. Nay more, you have expressly stated, if you shall succeed in nullifying the Bible as the word of God-for that is the main and final object of your essay-you "shall render science sacred, invest the practical duties of life with a religious character, and produce a faith [in what?] calculated to expand and purify itself by every advance in the discovery of truth [what is that truth, if the very Bible be a lie?], and to reinforce, by all the power and fervour of our highest emotions, the progress of mankind towards the utmost degree of improvement and happiness to which their nature is fitted to attain.' But, dear Sir, did it never occur to you that the greater the degree in such an advancement, the greater would be the positive misery of man, 66 66 when he found, after all, that his cup of "happiness" had still in it the poison of annihilation; and that he was daily and hourly haunted with the fear of that king of terrors who, in one moment, might dash from his lips even that cup, which to him contained all the happiness he was capable of enjoying or fitted to attain to? And is it possible that a human soul, that living spark divine," which has wandered so long, while only feeling" its way through the many intricate paths of science in search of truth, when its weary pilgrimage is nearly over, and when it has gotten, it may be, only a faint glimpse of that divine perfection, that pale death shall arrive, not as a messenger of peace, but as a ruthless tyrant, to summon it to its everlasting slumbers in the silent tomb? Impossible! "God is love," said John, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life," said the loving Jesus. Yet a second Reformation, you say, is imperatively called for; and George Combe, our greatest sceptic, must be our second Luther. Luther opened that Bible which the Pope had closed. George Combe would, if he could, annihilate that holy book without one feeling of remorse,- -a book whose contents are so well fitted to temper not only all our sweetest enjoyments in life, but also to comfort us in sorrow, to soothe the mind under its deepest afflictions, and to support the soul in the prospect of death, as well as in the dread moments of dissolution. Ah, there is a home beyond our narrow house of clay-a home of peace and love. Did not the aged Simeon once exclaim, "Lord, let now thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation"? And what was it also that comforted the heroic Paul in his last hour, when he preferred even to die a martyr's death than retract one hair's-breadth of God's blessed truth? "I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing." There is very little originality in your last essay after all. You have slavishly followed the infamous blasphemer Thomas Paine, and copied not only his very words, but also the very order of his arguments. He it was who first suggested that secular science, instead of the Bible, should be taught in every pulpit, that men might learn from Epicurus how to live worse than beasts. Paine, too, had a great mind. He fled from Paris in its bloody hour, that he might find a land of true liberty and rest; yet he afterwards died in New York, from the effects of beastly dissipation, in wretched poverty, disgrace, and filth. He, too, condemned the Bible. That book, he said, he had R |