siderable importance for the dogmatic controversy between the Greek and Latin Churches on the Holy Spirit. This dialogue expressly teaches that the Spirit proceeds from the Father" AND THE SON," which doctrine the Greeks have always maintained to be an adulteration of the ecumenical confessions of faith. The advocates of a union between the Greek and the Latin Churches have therefore naturally laid great stress on this passage, as, if the book itself were genuine, it would prove that the doctrine objected to by the Greeks was expressly taught by one of the most celebrated patriarchs. Professor Otto, of the Protestant Theological Faculty of Vienna, has however shown, in an article published in Niedner's Journal of Historic Theology, in 1850, that this dialogue does not belong to Gennadius, but that a unionist Greek (one in favor of a union with Rome) has taken it almost bodily from a Pseudo-Athanasian dialogue and falsely attributed it to Gennadius. Several German scholars, as Gieseler, (in his Church History, vol. iii,) and R. Hoffmann, (in his Symbolik, Leipzic, 1857,) have since declared their assent to the opinion of Professor Otto. Others, like Bähr (in Ersch's Allgemeine Encyclopädie, section 1, vol. lviii, page 205,) and Wagenmann, (Herzog's Real-Encyclopädie, vol. v, page 10,) have since continued to cite the work as one of Gennadius, probably without knowing the article of Professor Otto. The latter, therefore, in the article in the last number of Niedner's Journal, recurs to the subject, and brings forward new arguments in support of his opinion. French Reviews. REVUE DES DEUX MONDES.-August 1, 1863.-2. HAVET, Review of the Life of Jesus, by Renan. 3. LINDAU, A Voyage Around Japan. (Second article.) 9. MAZADE, The Russian System. 10. TAILLANDIER, A Book on the History of Protestantism in France. August 15.-3. CASIMIR PERIER, Memoirs of a British Diplomatist. 4. PAUL JANET, Cotemporaneous Materialism in Germany. 6. AUDIGANNE, Railroads after the Completion of the European Net. 9. MILSAND, Meditations of a Protestant Pastor. September 1.-2. CASIMIR PERIER, Reminiscences of a British Diplomatist. (Second article.) 3. AMPERE, The Struggles of Liberty at Rome. 5. LINDAU, A Voyage Around Japan. (Third article.) September 15.-5. JULES SIMON, Primary Instruction and Popular Libraries in France. 6. SAVENEY, Spiritism and the Spirits. October 1.-1. TAILLANDIER, The Tragedies of Henry Heine. 4. REVILLE, Apocalyptical Toleration among the Jews and the Christians. 6. JALOS, Madagascar, History of the Relations between Madagascar and France. 7. Public Instruction in Italy. October 15.-1. RENAN, Natural and Historical Sciences. 2. BAILLEUX DE MARISEY, The City of Paris, Its Finances and Public Works since the Beginning of the Century. 4. LAUGEL, The Civil War in the United States. (1861-63.) 5. LINDAU, A Voyage Around Japan. (Fourth article.) 6. MAZADE, Eight Months of War in Poland. 7. JULES DE LASTEYRIE, Ireland and the Cause of its Mystery. The Revue des Deux Mondes continues to devote a very large space of its columns to the discussion of the great religious questions of the day-the best proof how profoundly they agitate the highest literary circles of Europe. In the list of articles mentioned above we find a review of Renan's Life of Jesus, by Havet, Professor at the College de France; an essay on the History of French Protestantism, by the celebrated critic, Saint Rene Taillandier; a review of the recent materialistic literature of Germany, by Paul Janet; an article on the spiritualistic manifestations, by Saveney; an article by Reville, one of the most prolific writers of the critical school, on the Revelation of John; finally, a letter from Ernest Renan on Natural and Historical Sciences, giving a brief exposition of his present religious views. The Revue admits articles from eminent writers of all theological parties, though it evidently favors the school of which Renan is now the most famous representative. The letter of Renan on the Relation of Natural to Historical Sciences expresses a regret that his early studies have been devoted to the latter in preference to the former. No sciences, he now thinks, can do more for an elucidation of the mysterious history of mankind and the universe than the natural sciences. His own views and speculations, which Renan develops at some length, resemble those of Hegel. He concludes his letter with the following remarks: Does not Jesus live a thousand times more, is he not a thousand times more beloved now than he was at the moment when he lived? I do not refer to his reputation, his glory, which without being a vanity, is often a crying injustice. Many of the men who hold the first rank among mankind are and will remain unknown. "They live for God," as was said by the author of the treatise "De Rationis Imperio," an admirable treatise written by a cotemporary and countryman of Jesus. The greatest saints are the unknown saints, and God preserves the secret of the greatest merits which have ennobled a mortal being. A number of men, entirely unknown by the crowd, exercise in reality in the world a greater influence than men whose reputation makes the greatest noise. In God man is immortal. The categories of time and space are effaced in the absolute; what exists for the absolute is as much that which has been as that which will be. Thus live in God all the souls which have lived. Why should not the reign of the Spirit, the goal of the universe, be also the resurrection of every consciousness? The Spirit will be all-powerful, the idea will be all reality: what else signifies this language than that in the idea everything will revive? The manner in which these things will be accomplished cannot but escape us; for, I repeat, in thousands of centuries the condition of the world will perhaps be as different from the present condition as the mechanical atom is from a thought or from a sentiment. This much we may however affirm, that the final resurrection will be made through science, through the science either of men or of some other intelligent being. The scientific reform of the universe is the work scarcely commenced which devolves upon reason. A thousand times this attempt may be treated as a crime, a thousand times conservatism may cry out that we commit an outrage against God; but the progress of conscience is a fatal thing. Let us assume that our planet be condemned to reach only middling results, that habit, under the pretext of preserving the doctrines which it wants, should stifle the scientific spirit and incapacitate mankind for grand things: what would such a loss be for the whole universe? Not more than that of a grain of corn which falls upon a stone, or a germ of life which in the mysterious night of generation does not find the conditions favorable to its development. The article by Jules Simon, one of the greatest thinkers of modern France, on Primary Instruction, is highly instructive and suggestive. It makes the following remarks on the circulation of the Bible: In Protestant countries under every roof there is at least one book-the Bible. Every one knows of the number of Bibles given away in England. In Paris if you are present at a Protestant marriage you will always see the ceremony end in the giving of a Bible. It is a well-judged act of religion, and at the same time, in a secular point of view, it is a most useful custom for the poor. The presence of this one book brings back the recollection of school days, and perpetuates what was then learned. Now among Catholics the mass-book will be found rather than the Bible, and we must admit that even the mass-book is an exception. In most Churches the women tell beads upon their fingers, the men sing psalms from memory. At home they have nothing to read-not a journal, not even an almanac. Not only they read no books, but they see none! The visible sign of civilization is absent from the cottage. The Protestants who give a Bible to every couple on whose union a blessing is implored, render service, not to Protestantism only, but to mankind. Why have not Christian communities thought of circulating millions of copies of the Sermon on the mount, properly illustrated, to take the place of the gross wood-cuts whose defects do not always consist of mere offense against good taste? With what ardor would liberal thinkers bring their mite toward so blessed a work. REVUE CHRETIENNE-Aug. 15, 1863.-1. PRESSENSE, The Critical School We have already had occasion to speak of the article of Pressense against Renan. It is regarded in France, not only by orthodox Protestants, but also by many Roman Catholics, as the best that has yet been written. The article on Madame Swetchine gives an account of a Russian lady who, through the influence of De Maistre, was drawn toward and finally into the Church of Rome, and who for many years shone in the highest literary circles of Paris for her fervid piety, and great interest in the literary movements of the day. One of the most prominent members of the liberal Catholic school in France, Count de Falloux, has written her life, and more recently published an autobiographical work of hers, containing an account of the reasons which led her to Rome, and a collection of meditations and prayers. Mr. Kuhn's view of Madame Swetchine and her work is com prised at the conclusion of his article in these words: "As a theologian, she does not rise above common prejudices. As a spiritual writer, she remains within the narrow domain of mystic aspirations. Her piety lacks air and liberty. There is in her nothing grand, except the sentiment to which she consecrated her life: to seek God, to find, and to love him. But this is better than everything else." ART. XI.-QUARTERLY BOOK-TABLE. Religion, Theology, and Biblical Literature. Watson's Theological Institutes Defended; the Teaching of Transcendental Philosophy shown to be at variance with Scripture and Matter-of-Fact; and the Bible proved to be Complete in itself, both in Teaching and Evidence. By Rev. JOHN LEVINGTON. 12mo., pp. 283. For sale by T. K. Adams, Detroit. New York: Barnes & Burr. 1863. This volume consists of a polemic upon the articles in the Methodist Quarterly by Rev. Mr. Cocker upon the metaphysics of "Watson's Institutes;" an issue with certain positions of Dr. Dempster in Natural Theology; a defense of Grenville Penn's Theories of Geology; and the substance of Leslie's Short Method with the Deists. Mr. Levington is evidently very sincere and honest in his retention and maintenance of views once current but now somewhat obsolete, and his discussions are conducted in the spirit of Christian courtesy. Without claiming to be an Athanasius, he recognizes that his position is contra mundum. As we are of the "world," he of course does not expect that we should entertain the same appreciation with himself of the successive tractates (except the last) in his neat volume. We have never been able to understand why theologians have averred that the existence of a supreme deity could not be discovered by the reason of man. It seems to us an appalling concession to atheism. The steps by which the discovery is supposably attained are short, few, and obvious. The child asks, Who made me? Who made everything? Who made the world? And the child can understand the mother's answer. The positive elements of natural theology are often learned in five minutes at five years of age. Compare this simple process with the discoveries in Geometry, made beyond all doubt by natural human reason. Think of the numerous recondite steps to be taken by a matured mind before attaining the mastery of the forty-seventh of Euclid's First Book. The ignorance of the savage tribes of the earth of the existence of a God, admitting the fact, no more proves his existence undiscoverable by the human mind, than it proves that unaided man could not produce a school arithmetic. If Mr. Levington finds his faith and piety sustained by his philosophy, well. But let him not attribute "skepticism" to those who find the same support from the reverse view. Individually, the training of the writer of these lines was in the mental and moral philosophy of Locke and Paley as text authors. Their influence upon his mind was fearfully deleterious. Locke's derivation of our ideas primitively from matter through sensation; secondarily, from the minds operating upon those sensations, was rife to him with materialism, with atheism. It was impossible for him to escape the conclusion that all our thoughts were but impressions from a material object upon a material sensorium, and then material impressions again of those material impressions, and so on. Let two mirrors shed their reflections into each other in row, and you have the very image of the thing. From Paley he understood that right and wrong were mere creatures of education. He was from all this to his own mind a theoretic Christian only by being a bad logician. After such a cramped process he founded the revival of the larger old philosophy of Cudworth, and Henry More, though modified and christened with the modern epithet transcendental, to be a relief to his suffocated soul. The Locke philosophy, whether directly derived from Locke or not, he did recognize, but never accept, in Watson. But if the writer of this volume accepts and finds his faith and philosophy in harmony, far be it from us to offer any disturbance to either. But as to the defense of Grenville Penn's geology, the revival of the Ptolemaic astronomy would be about as hopeful a procedure, and about as creditable to the Christian apologist. Palmoni; or, the Numerals of Scripture a proof of Inspiration. A Free Inquiry. By M. MAHAN, D.D., St. Mark's-in-the-Bowery Professor of Ecclesiastical History in the General Theological Seminary. 12mo. pp. 176. New York: Appleton & Co. 1863. That there is some sort of significance in some of the biblical numbers has been vaguely recognized by theologians in the commonplace but not very intelligible statement that 66 seven is a number of perfection;" and no theological scholar will deny the significance of a numeral in Rev. xiii, 18. The perusal of Professor Stuart's Excursus on Scripture Numerals in the appendix to his Commentary on the Apocalypse will place beyond doubt the belief that scriptural numerals are largely symbolical and significant. The realistic character of our modern mind is unreflectingly disposed to reject such symbolism as puerile. In doing so it forgets that revelation has had to accommodate itself to the infantile age of the human race. It forgets that printing and even writing were once |