This is also the opinion of all persons with whom I have ever conversed on the subject, who, by daily experience in the performance of the Cathedral service, may be supposed to be well qualified to form a correct one.

EDWARD TAYLOR.

MR. FIELD ON HARMONIES OF THE GOSPELS.

Nos, qui sequimur probabilia, nec ultra quam id, quod verisimile occurrerit, progredi possumus, et refellere sine pertinacia, et refelli sine iracundia, parati sumus.-Cic. Tusc. Quæst. Lib. Sec.

SIR,

Dec. 10, 1848.

I HAVE often been greatly surprised to observe the little curiosity excited by the "grand question," as Bishop Marsh terms it, concerning the duration of Christ's ministry, which forms the subject of a letter addressed to you some considerable time ago (C. R. Jan. 1847). So far as I have found, after much inquiry, few, indeed, even among our divines, have ever thrown towards it even so much as a glance of their attention. Is it not strange that the biographical memoirs of the Great Teacher should be read and studied, and yet with no desire to be informed, upon the best remaining evidence, whether his public services were confined to a shorter or extended to a longer period? It seems discreditable to Christian scholars that the question should still be entirely unsettled, and almost unnoticed, whether the time allotted to the great affair of introducing the knowledge of religion in its purest form, by its first Preacher, was one year, or two, or three, or four, or even five years. All these different estimates of the time cannot rest upon grounds equally good, and surely means may yet be found of deciding which of these approaches nearest to the truth.

This reasonable expectation is supported by the history of the whole controversy, begun in the early ages of Christianity, and resumed, with much eagerness of contention, by numerous harmonists, since the revival of letters; of which a sketch is ably given by Bp. Marsh in his "Notes" to Michaelis' "Lectures on the New Testament." The most ancient opinion, that Christ's ministry continued one year and a few months, was supplanted by the hypothesis of Eusebius, in the fourth century, who extended the time from one to three years and a half; and this was generally received, though seldom much examined, till the beginning of the eighteenth century. About that time, the question, so long taken for granted, was brought into the field of discussion, and the light soon began to break in upon it. Bengelius, in his Harmony, published in 1736, reduced the time from three years and a half to little more than two years. The sagacity of Bentley, once turned to the subject, soon descried the true mode of bringing the question to a fair and final issue. It appeared to him that the probability of truth is decidedly in favour of their opinion who lived nearest the time of Christ, and who had, therefore, the best opportunity of ascertaining the real state of the fact. With his view that of Bishop Hare accorded; and in consequence of their joint communication to Mr. Mann, of the Charter House, the ancient opinion was adopted, asserted and ably maintained, in his work, entitled "De Veris Annis," &c., published in 1742. At first, the revived opinion had to encounter angry frowns and scornful repulse. But a better fate awaited it afterwards, and of late years it has obtained the justice of being fairly examined; of which the result, in many instances, has been its favourable reception. Nor let the assertion be scouted as utterly improbable, that the ancient will in no long time become, once more, the prevailing opinion.

The late excellent Dr. Carpenter, in the "Dissertations" prefixed to his "Harmony of the Gospels," has stated very fully the various opinions which have been held concerning the duration of Christ's ministry, and has urged very forcibly

the arguments which decided his own conviction. Perfectly agreed with him, that a year and a few months was the allotted term of Christ's ministerial labours, from that point our opinions begin widely to diverge. The disputed text, John vi. 4, which I regard, in the whole or in part, as an interpolation, and " a very awkward one too," he receives as genuine; the word pascha he refers to the last Passover, at which Jesus was crucified; and all the transactions related in the whole chapter, he thinks, did not occur till a little before that late period of time. According to him, for reasons not very easily understood, the evangelist John designedly placed these transactions out of their true chronological order; and for the purpose of preventing any misconception arising from this anachronism, he has prefixed their proper date in the very verse in question. The conjecture is sufficiently startling from its perfect novelty. It can find no support from the least surmise or suggestion, or hint leading to a suggestion, which has yet been discovered in any writer, ancient or modern, with the single exception of J. G. Vossius, whose work bears date 1643. That a passage, declarative of a mere matter of fact, should never have been understood as he understands it, for so many successive ages, is surely no slight presumption against his interpretation of it. If the verse in question was inserted as a date of time, strange to say! its true import, as referring to the last Passover, had been hidden from the eyes of all living through seventeen centuries, till at last it was brought out of darkness by Vossius, and presented to the full light of day by Dr. Carpenter. A date for any useful purpose is no date at all, if never rightly understood except by one or two discerning men; and what if this newly-discovered explanation is disputed, even utterly rejected, by other men of discernment, equal or not much inferior? One such, at least, there is in Mr. Benson, author of "The Chronology of the Saviour's Life," said to be "a judicious critic," who, speaking of Vossius' conjecture, thus expresses himself: "His proof is very weak, and his interpretation so forced, that it certainly reflects but little credit upon his critical acumen to have advanced or defended it." The proof on which Vossius relies is Luke ix. 51, and Dr. Carpenter places the same reliance upon it; though their interpretation of it stands opposed to such authorities as Pearce, Campbell, Wakefield and Bowyer.

As to myself, I have hardly yet recovered from my first astonishment on finding that the conjecture of Vossius, instead of a conjecture, is henceforth to be regarded as "a FACT so well established as never more to be called in question by any competent judge." The wonder excited by this assertion in one of the fairest and most candid of men and of writers, was immeasurably increased when his assumed fact was admitted, and the Harmony founded upon it adopted, by divines of no inconsiderable names both in the Old and New World. For who would not defer much to such names as those of Palfrey and Ware in America, and of Chapman and Means in England?-though it is quite possible that the high reputation of the harmonist may have given to his reasoning a force something more than its own. Vossius' opinion as a mere conjecture, more or less probable, might have deserved consideration. Those who are pleased with it may be allowed to call it "an ingenious conjecture," as Warburton's explanation of the 6th Enead was termed by Jortin, who, however, triumphantly refuted it. And all might suffer it to pass as a harmless conjecture, if it had not been made the basis of a Harmony which offers a violent shock to all the presumptions and probabilities which force themselves upon every thoughtful mind in reading the history of the Christian Revelation contained in the Four Gospels. But to hold up a mere conjecture, like that of Vossius, even if it possessed far more of probability, is an assumption against which, in the name of all that is just in reasoning and correct in language, a public protest ought to be entered.

Cherishing with profound respect the memory of our late harmonist, qualis

* Carpenter's Dissertations, pp. 21, 24.

neque candidiorem terra tulit, I must yet be allowed to express my extreme regret that his long and laborious researches should have terminated in results which will tend to retard, rather than accelerate, the progress of opinions towards the same general conclusion, not only as to the duration of Christ's ministry, but even as to the order and succession of all the most important events of his life. Respecting the first question, I venture to predict that from this time few will be found to contend for a longer period than two years, none for a shorter than one; and this, compared with former differences, is coming very nearly to a point. Then, as to the second question, if the four annual festivals, as they occur in John's Gospel, should be taken as so many fixed points; and if next to him, the authority of Matthew, both being eye-witnesses, should be chiefly regarded in determining the order of events, I cannot believe that there will ever be much difference in arranging the principal occurrences of the history. The dates introduced into former Harmonies, of course differ much, according to the supposed period which the whole history comprises. But, with the exception of those Harmonies formed upon the principle that all the evangelists wrote in exact chronological order, the difference in the arrangement of events in different Harmonies, as far as I have observed, is not very great; and it may be expected that this difference will be still less when the same number of events is to be distributed over the space of one or two, instead of three or four, years. Thus a pretty general concurrence of opinion among Christians, so much to be desired, is by no means improbable.

Thus the case stood when Dr. Carpenter's long-expected work appeared; and I am free to own that I cannot conceive even the possibility of obtaining any thing like general acceptance for the plan of a Harmony which lies open to the following objection, serious, all must allow, if not insurmountable. 1. It imputes to two biographers, both eye-witnesses, the first and the fourth, great chronological errors. 2. It reduces the whole term of Christ's active and public services from twelve or fifteen to little more than six months. 3. By crowding the facts of the history into a space so contracted, it renders the history itself less natural and probable. 4. The time allotted for the visits and journeys of Jesus after the mission of the Seventy, is so short as to become very nearly a case of physical impossibility. 5. By fixing the call of the apostles to so late a date, it withdraws their testimony, as known and authorized witnesses, from the earlier facts of the history, and, by allowing only three or four months for the time of personal intercourse between the Master and his disciples, it leaves no sufficient time for such intimate acquaintance as might enable them to exhibit a just idea of the extraordinary virtues of his character to the world.

The author of the new Harmony, to the deep regret of all to whom he was known, is no longer numbered with the living. But it is some satisfaction to recollect that most of the objections just stated were proposed to his consideration, and were answered by himself (C. R. 1835); and there are others, who have made his theory their own by adoption, who are well prepared, no doubt, to defend it. Among these is the Rev. Edwin Chapman, author of a pleasing and useful little work, "The Life of the Saviour." It would much gratify the readers of the Christian Reformer who take the least interest in the question, to be informed how he meets, to his own satisfaction, the force of objections which it seems impossible entirely to remove. I can sincerely repeat to himRefelli, sine iracundia, parati sumus.

Allow me, Mr. Editor, to conclude, as I have done on a former occasion, as follows:-"Whether or not my objections may appear to others fair and reasonable and forcible, they are opposed to his projected Harmony with the most sincere and affectionate esteem for the amiable and excellent person by whom it is proposed and zealously maintained. No words of praise can raise, and no imputation of error, real or supposed, can lower, the high reputation which he has obtained for himself; and for his long-continued exertions

in the cause of Christian truth, he will ever command the respectful and grateful regards of all who love and reverence Christianity as the best guide of thought, the best law of life, and the best source of hope and consolation to man in every possible circumstance of life or death."

W. F.

The remaining copies of "Scripture Questions on the Plan of a Harmony," to the number of 800, being returned by Messrs. Chapman as unsaleable, they are now distributed gratis. Sunday-schools and other schools, and classes of young persons, may be supplied with any required number by addressing a line to the author, Leam, near Leamington.

BOLINGBROKE'S MOTHER A PURITAN.

His early education was directed by a puritanical mother, whose imprudent zeal compelled him painfully to peruse huge tomes of controversial divinity when far too young to understand their value, and thus, perhaps, implanted in his mind the first seeds of his aversion to the truths of Revelation. “I resolve," he says himself, writing to Swift in 1721, "to make my letter at least as long as one of your sermons; and if you do not mend, my next shall be as long as one of Dr. Manton's, who taught my youth to yawn, and prepared me to be a High-churchman, that I might never hear him read nor read him more." It is, in fact, not a little remarkable that the two great champions of High-church at this time (1713), Oxford and Bolingbroke, should both have been bred up amongst the Dissenters. Manton, whom Bolingbroke thus alludes to, was a nonconforming and most voluminous divine, very worthy, but a little tedious, who, being impressed with some fanciful idea as to the analogy of numbers, wrote 119 sermons upon the cxixth Psalm!—Mahon's History of England, I. 34.

EDUCATION SHOULD TEACH INDEPENDENCE.

ASTONISHMENT and grief at the folly, especially in times like the present, of those parents who totally forget, in the formation of their children's habits, to inspire that vigorous independence which acknowledges the smallest possible number of wants, and so avoids a triumph over the negation of a thousand indulgences, by always having been taught and accustomed to do without them. "How many things," said Socrates, "I do not want!"-John Foster.

SIZE AND SOCIALITY.

THE stronger, more ingenious and greater two men are, the less are they likely to agree under one roof, as large insects who feed on fruits are unsocial. A hazel-nut, for instance, contains only one maggot; while the small, who live only on leaves, stick together as in a nest.-Jean Paul.

YOUTHFUL BASHFULNESS.

THE sight of a bashful young man is almost more sweet, and at the same time rarer, than that of a bashful girl. When virtue resents, he appears more femininely soft and she more masculinely strong.-Jean Paul.

Both Lord Oxford and Lord Bolingbroke were pupils of Mr. Woodhouse at Sheriff-hales, near Shiffnal, in Shropshire. See Toulmin's History of the Protestant Dissenters, pp. 225 and 559. Lord Oxford was a liberal patron of learning and a great collector of books; his MSS. are preserved in the British Museum.-Ed. C. R.

CRITICAL NOTICES.

England under the House of Hanover: its History and Condition during the Reigns of the Three Georges, illustrated from the Caricatures and Satires of the Day. By Thomas Wright, Esq., M. A., F.S.A. 2 vols. 8vo. London-Bentley.

THIS book does not entirely fulfil the large promise given in its title-page. The house of Hanover has now been represented by six English monarchs; and during the reigns of the three last of that house, the art of the caricaturist has risen in skill and importance far above the standard attained during the reigns of their immediate predecessors. Strange would be the ideas of the history and condition of England derived solely from the caricatures and satires of the day! These, when not occupied with passing trifles and follies, chiefly echo the noise of party cries or the clamours of popular prejudice. Measured by the attention of the caricatures, the Excise Bill was a more important matter than the putting aside of the house of Stuart and the O. P. rows than the loss of the American colonies. Still, the idea of Mr. Wright's book is a good one, however imperfectly he may have realized it. He has been led, in illustrating the lampoons and caricatures of succeeding periods, to dig up much curious matter which might otherwise be soon buried in oblivion. His amusing page exhibits many details respecting past manners, habits, popular follies and prejudices, akin to which we have nothing now remaining. Generally speaking, he has executed his task in a fair spirit, and held the scales equally between sects and parties. If there be any exceptions to this remark, they are to be found in the latter part of his work, when engaged in describing scenes which roused the prejudices of the generation preceding our own.

It is somewhat strange that caricatures had not an earlier birth in England. Humour, their chief ingredient, belongs essentially to the national mind. This is apparent in every period of our literature. To say nothing of our dramatists, it is seen in every page of Chaucer and Butler, and it forces its way in the polemics of Marvell and the sermons of South. Nothing but the low state of the arts of drawing and engraving in England could have smothered, in the 16th and 17th centuries, the national taste for the caricature. It was his comparative advance in those two arts that gave the dull and heavy inhabitant of the marshes of Holland precedence in the composition of pictorial satires.

We have been much struck, in looking through these two very entertaining volumes, with perceiving how largely party movements have been affected by considerations of a religious character. The odium theologicum has often suggested a topic to the caricaturist. This circumstance it is which chiefly brings Mr. Wright's History under our notice; and we propose in this and probably another article to introduce to our readers some of those passages which throw light on the religious history of England.

The first considerable topic belongs, not to the house of Hanover, but to the reign which preceded the accession of its first English prince. It was only in the reign of Anne that Sacheverell was an object of regard. It was not to the credit of the country that a person so despicable in character and talent was at any time able to excite great popular fervour. To the party who adopted him as a hero and paraded him as a confessor, he is a lasting discredit. The Whigs made an enormous blunder in prosecuting this contemptible person, and his history consequent on the prosecution reads to statesmen the lesson that forbearance is sometimes the truest policy of Government.

"The first regular political mob was a High-church mob, stirred up for the purpose of raising a clamour against the Whigs, and to influence the elections for Parliament. This appeal to the lower orders was made through a divine of very little moral character and no great abilities, the notorious Dr. Henry