at all-the root of the evil consists not so much in the form or tendency of our creed, as in the unsanctified temper of our hearts.' You would, therefore, set about sanctifying his heart for him. or look to the Holy Spirit to do it, as a sovereign, unconditional act, without any reference to divine testimony, to faith, or to baptism.

"When would the gospel be carried among the heathen?" We cannot tell when; but doubt not, the ancient order of things being restored, much sooner than it now will, by all the sectarian institutions of our time.

I am not opposed to missions, nor to missionary support; but let them originate in, and be confined to the church. If the congregation to which I at present belong, were able and disposed to send out one of its members and support him in publishing the glad tidings of salvation to any people, considering him amenable only to the Lord and to itself, I would not object, nor be found among the last to contribute to his support. Nor would I refuse to go myself to Burmah, under such patronage. But if a Missionary Convention be talked of-a Board of Managers from different churches, to appoint agents to collect funds for this purpose-a going first before this Board to be examined in reference to some special call to be licensed by it and sent out, or by it kept at home; I would regard this as altogether another institution, and from it stand aloof.

I have considered the case of the poor widow, which you submitted to me, and have placed myself in her condition. Such, if I mistake not, was my real condition, (or one very like it,) three or four years ago; when I contributed liberally to what I then regarded "the benevolent operations of the present day." But had I then known what I now know, that these "operations" were not of heaven, but of men; had I supposed that an appropriation would be made out of these funds to pay Judas for the worst of all purposes-for betraying my Lord and Master-I would have kept back my mite, as I now do, for another treasury; and in so doing, would then have expected, as I now expect, to be approved by HIM who searches the heart, and who will judge and reward every man according to his works.

Finally, my dear brother, accept of my unfeigned thanks for the good intentions your charity has awarded to me in my aberrations from the orthodox faith and practice; and be assured that I never attributed to you, nor do I now attribute, any other than the purest motives in going among the heathen. I thank you for your exhortations; and in turn, beseech you, if you neglect all the other books which I sent, neglect not "THE SACRED WRITINGS OF THE APOSTLES AND EVANGELISTS OF JESUS CHRIST.”

With the best wishes,

`I remain, yours,

To JONATHAN WADE, American Baptist Missionary, Burmah.

F. W. EMMONS.

NEW VERSION DEFENDED;

AND

0. Jennings, D. D. Exposed---No. 1.

HAVING in our Extra, No. 5, given the prominent features of the moral character of Dr. Jennings' book, we now proceed to examine some of its arguments and criticisms. His criticisms on the Greek text and his strictures on the New Version first claim attention.

In our confabulation in Nashville, Mr. Jennings relied on Ephes. ii. 8. as proof that faith is the special gift of God in some supernatural way, to certain individuals. We argued that every thing enjoyed by man is the bounty or gift of God. Such are all his corporeal and mental powers. The five external senses, perception, memory, imagination, judgment, reason, are God's gifts to us: so are food, raiment, education, faith, hope, and charity. But he has his own way of giving us every thing. He bestows food, raiment, education, knowledge, faith, hope, and love, by the use of certain means, and in certain channels. He gives us faith, knowledge, bread, and water, not by miracle or peculiar interposition; but by stated means or laws from which he does not depart. It is affirmed that he has sometimes fed and clothed men by miracle, and imparted faith, knowledge, and all other things by special interposition; but this is not now the order of things. Ravens feed not our Elijahs. The cruise of oil and the handful of flour of our widows become not barrels. Manna falls not round our tents, nor do our shoes and hats continue new for forty years. No longer can a thousand men feed on one loaf and leave more than two. No light from heaven above the brightness of the sun shines around our persecuting foes, nor are our modern Sauls converted into Pauls by a voice and impulse immediate from the skies. Faith now comes by hearing the word of God.

Mr. Jennings and they of his school contend that faith in every instance is a special grace, wrought in the heart, by sending the Holy Spirit on a special errand to every elect man, woman, and child; and that unless there be this special errand, and work upon the heart, no man can believe to salvation any thing which God speaks. He affirms that it requires the same power to work faith in the heart which was requisite to raise Jesus from the dead. Consequently the resurrection of Christ is no greater miracle than was the faith possessed by Mr. Jennings and all other persons making the same pretensions!

To sustain this view of faith he quoted Eph. ii, &c. alleging that Paul said that faith was the gift of God in his sense of the word gift. To which we replied, that Paul no where said that faith was the special gift of God. Thus the reader has the matter fairly before him.

The common version of chap. ii. 28. was then quoted: "By grace you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God." We replied, that the word faith could not be the antece

dent to the word that: for one of the most common rules of syntax decides that "the relative must agree with its antecedent in gender and number." PISTIs, the antecedent, is feminine; and TOUTO, the relative, is neuter. If, then, that refer to faith, the most general rule of Greek syntax is set at naught, and the meaning of ten thousand passages rendered matters of doubtful disputation; for if Mr. Jennings could have sustained his point, he would have subverted the laws of the Greek language, and made the New Testament no better than the dreams of Bunyan

He quotes Doddridge as asserting that in order to save Paul from a "flat tautology," it is better to make TOUTO refer to pistis, than to reject "the weightiest and most natural interpretation," because "judicious critics" have laid so much stress upon syntax." Doddridge is at one time condemned, and at another approved by Mr. Jennings. On ecclesia he is heterodox; but in his note upon Eph. ii. 8. he is orthodox. All this is natural enough. Mr. J. in order to set aside this universal rule, goes in quest of exceptions to it, and concluded he had found five besides the text in dispute. Here they

are:

Eph. ii. 8. "For by grace are you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God." Phil. i. 28. "And in nothing terrified by your adversaries: which to them is an evident token of perdition; but to you of salvation, and that of God," Eph. vi. 18. Praying always, with all prayer and supplication in the spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance." Gal. iii. 17. "And this I say, that the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ." 1 Cor. vi. 11. "Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers," &c. "shall inherit the kingdom of God; and such were some of you."

Here are five instances of similar construction, four of them in proof of the first, in which this rule of syntax is said to be violated. In the first, pistis, (faith,) feminine; in the second, soteria, (salvation,) feminine; in the third, proseuche and deesis, (prayer and supplication,) both feminine; in the fourth, diatheke, (covenant,) feminine; in the fifth, pornoi, eidolatria, moichoi, (fornicators, idolators, adulterers,) all masculine: and in the four first we have TOUTO, neuter, said to agree with them; and in the fifth we have TAUTA, neuter and plural. To these he adds another instance of a different sort. Gal. iv, 19. "My little children (teknia, neuter,) of whom (ous, masculine,) I travail in birth again." These six are adduced in proof that a relative may not agree with its antecedent in gender and number; or that because six exceptions are found, the rule is not general; and therefore we may make an exception whenever it suits our caprice or prejudice. Such in all fairness and honesty is the proof adduced to prove that Paul calls faith the gift of God in the most special import of the word gift.

Our objections to this are the three following:

1. Were it fairly proved that there are exceptions to this general rule, it ought to be proved that Eph. ii. 8. (the text in dispute) is one of these. This Mr. Jennings has not attempted; consequently all

his other supposed exceptions can prove nothing in the case. It is absolute tyranny over language to call one word an outlaw, and then summon five others called outlaws to prove that the word in dispute is also an outlaw.

2. On the principle assumed a disputant has nothing to do, when pressed with any difficulty, but to declare that what he cannot explain, or admit with, safety to his scheme, is an exception!

3. But these instances are not exceptions to the above rule; consequently his premises are false. This we shall now prove.

In the first place TOUTO belongs to that class of adjective pronouns called in the grammars used in Oxford, Cambridge, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dublin, and in North America, demonstrative; and this class of pronouns being both adjective and relative, each of them is subject to the most general rule in syntax-it must agree in gender and number with that to which it refers, whether antecedent or consequent. There is not a rule more universal in the Greek or Latin language.

But there is another rule, of which our author seems to have been altogether ignorant, which sweeps off at one brush four of his six, and explains the mystery of these alleged exceptions. It is in the words following, to wit:-"When the relative respects a whole sentence it is put in the NEUTER gender." No matter what gender precedes it: FOR A SENTENCE IS ALWAYS NEUTER! as, Meus carus amicus mortuus est, QUOD est mihi summo dolori-(My dear friend is dead, which is a very great grief to me)-which affair or thing is a grief to me.Me methuskesthe oino, en ho [neuter] estin assotia-(be not drunk with wine, in which (thing, not wine,) is profligacy. We place under this general rule four of his examples. "By grace you are saved through faith; and this [thing, or affair,] is not of yourselves: it is the gift of God. The relative touto, [this,] which is in the neuter gender, cannot stand for pistis, [faith,] which is the feminine; but it has the whole sentence which goes before for its antecedent." So say Chandler, Macknight, and Dr. A. Clark. Phil. i. 27, 28. "Stand fast in one spirit, striving together for the faith of the gospel; and in nothing terrified by your enemies; which is to them an evident token of perdition; but to you of salvation: and this [thing] from God." I have just now examined Adam Clark, Thomson, Pierce, Halet, and Macknight, who concur with the above. But in Griesbach's pointing it is still more plain. He points it thus:-"Which is to them a manifestation of destruction, but to you of salvation:-and this from God, because this has been granted you for Christ," &c. Eph. vi. 18. falls under the same rule. "Praying always with all prayer and supplication; and for this purpose watch," &c. So Macknight, Thomson, cum multis aliis. So also Gal. iii. 17. “And this (thing) Í say, that the covenant," &c

The example brought from 1 Cor. vi. 11. is a begging of the question altogether; for touto has not for its antecedent nouns of the same gender. The following rule disposes of this example:-"Two nouns, one masculine and one feminine, are joined with an adjective neuter

plural." Males and females are included in these nouns: thus some of them are of the common gender.

His sixth and last example falls very naturally under the following rule: "Relatives often agree with their antecedents, not as to their ar bitrary gender, but as to their sense. "Matthew xxviii. 19, Convert the nations, (ta ethna, neuter) baptizing them, (autous, masculine)Rom. ii. 14, Col. ii. 19, Rev. xvii. 16. See Parkhurst, page 63, in his syntax. So in the case advanced, children (tecknia) neuter, includes both males and females; and as the masculine is more worthy than the feminine, as grammarians say, hous refers to the masculine. Neither of these last examples belong to the subject in dispute.

Thus, by the unalterable laws of syntax, we refer each of his examples to well established rules, and show that Mr. Jennings was either ignorant of the genius of the language, or else wittingly imposed upon his readers. The former, we would opine, rather than the latter. Indeed, he asks with such apparent surprize, Where did Mr. Campbell get the word "affair" in Ephesians ii. 8? that we must suppose him ignorant of the whole matter.

Must we suppose that he did not know that not A. Campbell, but J. Macknight, found the word affair! And did he not know from the Latin grammar itself that an adjective or pronoun in the neuter gender, without a substantive, in construction always has negotium, signifying affair, or thing, understood? (In the Greek language, pragma represents negotium.) So that affair or thing is, by the laws of Greece and Rome, comprehended in the word touto, standing as it does in Eph. ii. 8.

Macknight's version of this passage is thus sustained by unquestionable authority. It is in perfect conformity with Greek and Latin syntax. We know of no man of any literary, pretensions who has presumed to question it. The Latin versions which we have seen agree with it: that of Arias Montanus reads thus-"Nam gratia estis servate per fidem; et hoc non ex vobis; Dei donum." The Vulgate, also, "Gratia enim illa estis servati_(et hoc non est ex vobis sed Dei donum est.)" The most heterodox English versions, as well as the orthodox, so read it. One of this class lying before me thus translates it: "For by favor you are saved through faith; and this salvation is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God." Had the king's translators thought that touto referred to faith, they would not have rendered it that, but this, as referring to the last mentioned, as their manner was. So that we have all versions, and all authority, against Mr. Jennings. So plain is this passage, that I think Macknight's supplement redundant, and wholly unnecessary, though perfectly justifiable for explanation. I also think that the king's translators are awkwardly plain in preferring that to this. With Griesbach's punctuation it needs no supplement: "For by favor you are saved through faith; and this not from yourselves; the gift of God, not from works: so that no one can boast."

Some Greek, Latin and English Testaments, like the anonymous version now lying before me, read and print it thus, on the authority