example for the church in the nineteenth to imitate-ergo-as the church in Milan set the civil power in Milan at defiance, so the Church of England must resist the civil power of England, if any attempt should be made to meddle with her immunities and emoluments. Upon the whole I have the following remarks to offer:

1. Respecting the miracle alleged to have been performed, so unexpectedly pressed into the service of the Church of England, it comes to us upon the anthority of Ambrose, Augustine, and Paulinus; but as the latter was the secretary of the former, we may dispense with his testimony, not being that of an independent witness, but derived from his master's. Augustine mentions it in De Civitat. Dei, lib. xxii. c. 8; in one of his discourses preached upon the festival of the two martyrs, Serm. 286; and in De Confessionum, lib. ix. c. 7. Ambrose narrates it at large in a letter to his sister, which may be found in the second volume of the Benedictine edition of his works, Epist. xxii. ad Marcellina Soror, and in Serm. contr. Auxentium de Basilicis tradendis, tom. 2. pp. 852-880. The Roman Catholic writers of course receive it unhesitatingly, and some divines of the Church of England besides Mr. Newman have done so. See Tillemont. Hist. Eccles. tom. 2. Art. S. Gervais and S. Protais; Dr. Resbury, The Eleventh Note of the Church Examined, against Cardinal Bellarmine. I would observe, however, First, that supposing miracles to have been continued after the race of apostolical men expired, which I do not believe, it is monstrous to imagine that Providence interposed to sanction such a piece of superstition as the dedicating of a church by depositing in it the relics of martyrs. Gibbon slyly remarks," I should recommend this miracle to our divines, if it did not prove the worship of relics, as well as the Nicene creed." Hist. Dec. and Fall, vol. v. p. 40. note. Secondly. The two accounts do not tally. Augustine tells us that the place where the martyrs lay was made known to Ambrose in a dream. De Civ. Dei, lib. xxii. c. 8. § 2. Ambrose says nothing about the dream, which he assuredly would have done had it happened, in order to increase the amount of evidence in his favour against the Arians. Thirdly. The bulk of the bodies found is described as gigantic, and this is regarded as corroborating the popular notion of the gradual decrease of the human stature"invenimus miræ magnitudinis viros duos, ut prisca ætas ferebat," are the words of Ambrose to his sister-" we found two men of wonderful bulk, such as olden times were wont to produce." Epist. ad Marcel. xxii. Fourthly. Severus is stated to have been blind only for a season, and might have had his sight restored by the previous use of natural means, about the time when the remains. were exhumed. No enquiry at all seems to have been made, to ascertain accurately the means of his cure. Fifthly. The ageabounded with instances of what are called, not very properly, pious. frauds. Sixthly. The orthodox Milanese were in a temper of mind, disposed to catch at any unusual event, and interpret it as a miracle in their favour. Seventhly. The occasion presented a tempting opportunity for unscrupulous partizans to get up a miracle, in order to spite the Arians, and magnify themselves. To my mind, therefore,

Mr. Newman's argument appears to be constructed somewhat like Nebuchadnezzar's image, having a head of gold and feet of clay. I do not believe for a moment, that either Ambrose or Augustine would have lent themselves to an imposture, or would wilfully misrepresent any transaction, for both were far above their generation in integrity and piety. But the way seems plainly open for us to conclude them to have been misled by an ignorant or a designing populace; just as we may conceive the good bishop of Milan to have been wrong in his natural philosophy, when arguing the conception of the Virgin, from the fact that female vultures propagate without the male! and mistaken likewise in his exegesis, when expounding the four beasts of the Revelations to mean the four evangelists, Matthew being the man, Mark the lion, Luke the calf, and John the eagle! Ambrosii Opera, Hexameron, Pref. Com. Luke, tom. 1. Benedic. Gibbon remarks upon the whole transaction-" The reason of the present age may perhaps approve the incredulity of Justina and her Arian court; who derided the theatrical representations, which were exhibited by the contrivance, and at the expense of the archbishop. Their effect, however, on the minds of the people was rapid and irresistible; and the feeble sovereign of Italy found himself unable to contend with the favourite of heaven." Hist. Decline and Fall, vol. v. p.46. This is written coldly enough, but it is certainly true, as far as the miracle having been a "theatrical representation," exhibited at the "expense," though not by the "contrivance" of Ambrose.

2. Supposing, however, we take the miracle to be true, and a divine demonstration in favour of the attitude which Ambrose assumed towards the imperial court, there are obvious difficulties in the way of the Anglican church doing likewise, though ever so much inclined. Mr. Newman indeed omits to notice the difference between the circumstances of the church in the fourth century, and the Church of England in the nineteenth-between Ambrose, bishop of Milan, and Howley, archbishop of Canterbury, or Bagot, bishop of Oxford-but the difference is not trifling, and wholly in favour of the former. In the fourth century the church was under the protection and in alliance with the state, but the marriage settlements had not been definitely fixed, nor the precise nature of the contract declared, and the relation of the two parties was wholly different to that which now subsists between the church and state of England. Ambrose had taken the oath of allegiance to Valentinian as his temporal sovereign, but there is no evidence that he had done so as his ecclesiastical head; nay, his writings assert the principle, and his whole conduct was founded upon it, that in spiritual things he owned no earthly liege-lord.

"Do not," he observes, "O emperor, embarrass yourself with the thought that you have an emperor's right over sacred things. Exalt not yourself, but as you would enjoy a continuance of power, be God's subject. It is written, God's to God, and Cæsar's to Cæsar. The palace is the emperor's, the churches are the bishops'." Epist. xx.

"I had a meeting," he states again, “with the counts and tribunes, who urged me to give up the Basilica without delay, on the ground that the emperor was but acting on his undoubted rights, as possessing sovereign power over all

things. I made answer, that if he asked me for what was my own-for instance, my estate, my money, or the like-I would make no opposition; though to tell the truth all that was mine was the property of the poor; but that he had no sovereignty over things sacred."

"No one can deny that in what we say we pay to our sovereign due honour. What indeed can be higher than to style him a son of the church? In saying this, we are loyal to him without sinning against God. For the emperor is within the church, but not over the church; and a religious sovereign seeks, not rejects the church's aid. This is our doctrine, modestly avowed, but enforced without wavering." Serm. Cont. Auxent. de Basil.

I am not now arguing the point, whether according to the laws of the empire, Valentinian had a legal right to the property of the church or not; but simply stating the views which Ambrose entertained, as to the proper province of the imperial will. During the Arian disputes, Auxentius, their bishop, sought to have a doctrinal discussion with him, the Emperor being the final arbitrator. I extract the following from his answer:—

"Clementissimo Imperatori et beatissimo Augusto Valentiniano, Ambrosius episcopus

"Dalmatius, tribune and notary, has come to me, at your majesty's desire, as he assures me, to require me to choose umpires, as Auxentius has done on his part. Not that he informed me who they were which had already been named; but merely said that the dispute was to take place in the consistory, in your majesty's presence, as final arbitrator of it.

"I trust my answer will prove satisfactory. When was it you ever heard, most gracious sovereign, that in a question of faith laymen should be judges of a bishop? What! Have courtly manners so bent our backs, that we should have forgotten the rights of the priesthood, that I should of myself put into another's hands what God has bestowed upon me? Once grant that a layman may set a bishop right, and see what will follow. The layman must discuss, while the bishop listens; the bishop must be the pupil of the layman. Yet, whether we turn to scripture or history, who will venture to deny that in a question of faith, in a question, I say, of faith, it has ever been a bishop's business to judge a Christian emperor, not the emperor's to judge the bishop.'

Let us now view the following documents belonging to the Church of England, in connexion with the preceding statements. The first is one of the articles of Canon xxxvi, which every clergyman is required to sign; the second is an extract from the king's declaration prefixed to the thirty-nine articles; and the third is the oath of supremacy administered in the ordination of bishops, priests, and deacons.

"That the king's majesty, under God, is the only supreme governor of this realm, and of all other his highness's dominions and countries, as well in all spiritual or ecclesiastical things or causes, as temporal; and that no foreign prince, person, prelate, state or potentate hath, or ought to have, any jurisdiction, power, superiority, pre-eminence, or authority, ecclesiastical or spiritual, within his majesty's said realms, dominions, and countries."

"Being by God's ordinance, according to our just title, defender of the faith, and supreme governor of the church, within these our dominions, we hold it most agreeable to this our kingly office, and our own religious zeal, to conserve and maintain the church committed to our charge, in unity of true religion, and in the bond of peace; and not to suffer unnecessary disputations, altercations, or questions to be raised, which may nourish faction both in the church and commonwealth. We have therefore, upon mature deliberation, and with the advice of so many of our bishops as might conveniently be called together, thought fit to

make this declaration following: That we are the supreme governor of the Church of England.

"I, A. B., do utterly testify and declare in my conscience, that the king's highness is the only supreme governor of this realm, and of all other his highness's dominions and countries, as well in all spiritual or ecclesiastical things or causes, as temporal."

It is plain from these documents, that the circumstances of the church in the fourth century, as exhibited by Ambrose, and those of the Church of England in the nineteenth, are as widely different as was the situation of Israel out of Egypt and in it; and Mr. Newman, in believing the jus divinum of the bishop of Milan's doings, condemns the position which, as a clergyman, he occupies, and repudiates the canons and constitution of the establishment.

3. I have said that Ambrose acted rightly in the main; and here I refer to his asserting a scriptural principle, a principle of dissent likewise, the non-interference of the civil power with the domain of conscience; I neither vindicate his superstition, nor justify all the measures he adopted to thwart the designs of the Roman court.

4. If authority now attaches itself to the life, doctrine, ecclesiastical principles, and proceedings of Ambrose, as Mr. Newman believes and asserts, then we may fairly claim him for a convert to another dissenting principle. It was by the free suffrages of the Milanese, in the cathedral of the city, and not by the choice of court or conclave, that Ambrose was elected bishop; so that while the church in the fourth century rebukes the conduct of the Church of England in the nineteenth, in this matter, it sanctions a maxim of nonconformity. But in proportion as authority attaches itself to Ambrose, some of Mr. Newman's peculiar and fondly-cherished notions are weakened thereby; for it is a curious fact, that the bishop of Milan was chosen to the episcopate before he was baptized, and consequently before his body, according to the new Oxford theology, had become the "tabernacle of divine grace." If, therefore, as the writer of the "Church of the Fathers" maintains, a divine sanction was given by a miracle to an individual who was elected a christian bishop without christian baptism, I do not see how the conclusion can be escaped, that a man may be a fit subject for christian communion and a christian burial, who has never been sprinkled from an episcopal font.

I now close these somewhat cursory remarks upon this volume with an extract from the chapter on "Anthony in calm"-a passage which comes oddly enough from one who, with all his admiration at Ambrose's rejection of court favour, can yet sigh at the probable termination of that "quiet and pleasant course" of things, which subsisted during the early part of the reign of "our blessed martyr St. Charles," and through the whole of that of "King George the good."

"If I must choose between the fashionable doctrines of one age and of another, certainly I shall prefer that which requires self-denial, and creates hardihood and contempt of the world, to some of the creeds now in esteem, which rob faith of all its substance, its grace, its nobleness, and its strength, and excuse self-indulgence by the arguments of spiritual pride, self-confidence, and ecurity-which, in short, make it their boast that they are much more comfortable

than that ancient creed which, together with joy, leads men to continual smiting on the breast, and prayers for pardon, and looking forward to the judgment day, as to an event really to happen to themselves individually."—p. 382.*

M.

April 14th.

ESSAYS ON THE BOOK OF JOB.

No. II.

BY THE REV. RALPH WARDLAW, D.D., GLASGOW.

II. The next points into which it was proposed to inquire, were, the TIME and the AUTHOR of this Book.

There is a previous question, which is obviously distinct from both of these inquiries, the question, namely-When and where did Job live? The settlement of this question will not, I am aware, ascertain the date of the Book itself, further than in one negative point of view, that the book could not be written earlier than the subject of it lived. It might, however be later, and even much later, than his own time.

"The land of Uz," mentioned as the place of the patriarch's residence, is generally admitted to be the same as Idumea, a district of Arabia Petræa-the stony Arabia. "The only objection deserving notice, that can be raised against this supposition, is drawn from the great distance of Idumea from the country of the Chaldeans, who, living on the borders of the Euphrates, could not easily have made depredations on the camels of Job. And this has been thought by some a sufficient cause for assigning to Job a situation in Arabia deserta, and not far from the Euphrates. But, as Lowth replies, what should prevent the Chaldeans as well as the Sabeans, a people addicted to rapine, and roving about at immense distances for the sake of plunder, from wandering through those defenceless regions, and pervading from the Euphrates even to Egypt? And, on the other hand, what probability is there that all the friends of Job, residing in and near Idumea, should be instantly informed of all that had happened to Job in the desert of Arabia, and on the confines of Chaldea, and repair thither immediately after the transaction? I do not enter more minutely into this point; all such discussions of geographical locality, unless connected with important results, being generally felt to be dry and uninteresting. And of the particular residences of Job's friends, we may say a little, when we come to that part of the narrative where they are introduced.

* While writing the above, I met with an advertisement of the "Church of the Fathers," with Mr Newman's name, and therefore continued to use it, though it does not appear upon the title-page of the book.

N. S. VOL. IV.

+ Magee, vol. ii. pp. 56, 57.

3 A