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descriptions are, however, not unfavorable. But whatever may be done there or elsewhere, we do not apprehend that our own country is likely to suffer from the development in Australia of this important branch of agriculture and commerce, especially under the now almost certain improvement of our own industrial system.

Upon the mineral wealth of Australia we need say but little, for the reason that thousands who know nothing else about the country know that it is a land of gold to which multitudes have resorted from many countries, our own included, to gather the rich spoil. It is now nearly thirteen years since the discovery of the gold fields. The first were found by a Mr. Hargreaves, in the Bathurst district, in New South Wales. He had lived several years in the vicinity, but had left the colony and gone to California when the precious metal was discovered there. Returning, he was struck with the resemblance of the geological formation in his own neighborhood to that of California. He commenced searching for gold, which he was not long in discovering. About four months after still richer deposits were found in the colony of Victoria. Gold fields have since been discovered, though none so rich or extensive as the two named, in various parts of the continent. With the important and remarkable consequences of this discovery all are familiar, for it has been the same there substantially as in our own country. Besides gold, there are valuable iron mines; also mines of tin, lead, and especially of copper. Extensive beds of coal, too, have been brought to light, and have proved veritable mines of wealth to their proprietors.

The aborigines of Australia are almost unanimously described by all writers on the subject as the lowest and most degraded of the human family. They are inferior in feature and figure to the Africans; of a dark earth-brown color; "with sloeblack savage eyes widely set against their high cheek bones, and under protruding bushy black eyebrows; with distended nostrils, wide mouth, broad pouting lips, matted long black hair, shrunken frame, long thin arms, short outspread feet, spindle-legs, bedaubed and greased from head to foot, and ⚫ without decency and without shame." These are the most general characteristics, though there is a considerable variety in the different tribes, some of them being more brave and

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warlike than others. They have hitherto persistently withstood all attempts to civilize and Christianize them. Their numbers have been variously estimated at from two hundred thousand to four hundred thousand. But whether more or less, they are rapidly diminishing, and in not many years they will probably have wholly disappeared before the superior race, following the universal law.

We have sketched the history and character of Australia without much reference to the neighboring islands of New Zealand and Tasmania, either of which is large enough for two or three European kingdoms, besides some smaller but still important colonies. But we may easily see here the elements of a mighty Anglo-Saxon empire forming on the other side of the world, in countries rich in natural resources and with superior facilities for commerce. Within a very few years there will be ten or twelve great and populous colonies, each enjoying the chief features of popular sovereignty, yet still recognizing dependence on the mother country. That this dependence will be perpetuated is scarcely reasonable to expect; and the probability is that by the time another century opens an independent Anglo-Saxon nation, the Confederate Republic of Australasia, will be among the mighty and influential powers of the earth.

ART. VII.-CHRISTOLOGY.

THE doctrine of Christ is at once the most important and the most inscrutable that was ever made the subject of human thought. It is the most important because it comprehends not only the doctrine of God, but of God in his several manifestations of mercy in behalf of our race; the most inscrutable, because it involves the mysteries not only of Godhead and manhood, but of these multiplied into each other by the union of the two natures in one person.

The pre-existent Logos; the humanity with parentage inef fably mysterious; the Logos and humanity constituting one

personality; this person, capable alike of being tempted and of succoring them that are tempted; of weeping at the grave of a friend, and of raising that friend from the dead; of dying himself, and yet able to "destroy him that hath the power of death;" whose life was a miracle not only of wisdom and power, but of tenderness and love: such a person is the product of no human thought or philosophy, but the "Son of God with power."

The doctrine of Jesus is thus stated: "Thou shalt bring forth a son and shalt call his name Jesus." Although this was the name by which he was called, both in childhood, and manhood, by those who knew him only as a man, yet we dare not say that Jesus was a personal designation of his humanity, because this might imply that there were two persons to be united instead of two natures. But whether personal or official, it was the name selected for Mary's son, for that which should be born of her. If it should be contended that the act of incarnation did not take place at the birth, but previously, it would not necessarily nor probably follow that more than humanity was born of the virgin; for if God, the Logos, might "forsake" Jesus during the agonies of the crucifixion, might he not also at his birth? Our persons are formed by the union of soul and body; and as the death of the body, and its consequent long sleep in the grave, do not make it necessary that the soul should sleep there with it, in order to maintain the integrity of the person, so the humanity of Christ, whether it be in the womb of the virgin or cold (that is, the body of it) in the tomb, belongs as much to the person of the Son of God as when the glory of the manifested presence makes his "face to shine as the sun, and his raiment white as the light." I think, therefore, we may safely affirm that nothing but the humanity of Christ was born of the virgin. Mary was the mother of Jesus, not of God. She is called the mother of Jesus, but not of Christ. Strictly speaking, therefore, Jesus is the proper name for all of Christ that is human, though without doubt it is sometimes used by an interchange of appellations between the two natures, to designate the entire personality, as are vine, servant, and other names which are not at all appropriate in respect of his divinity.

We cannot well overestimate the importance of the doctrine

of the pure, essential humanity of Christ. Without this there could be no proper body for sacrifice, as will appear in the sequel. But to ascribe super-humanity to Jesus, to make him the "Son of God" simply because he was begotten by the Holy Ghost, is both a radical and an inexcusable error. For why should a man begotten of the virgin by the Holy Ghost be superhuman, any more than a woman taken from the side of a man by the same power? or than the first man, who was created by a still more direct exercise of divine power, and consequently with less intervention of secondary causes? What, therefore, was above humanity, as developed in the life of Jesus, was not because of the miraculous conception, but because the "Logos was made flesh." Nor was the flesh any less, nor any more flesh, because the Logos was united with it. And such clearly is the Scripture doctrine; for it is said, "that as the children were partakers of flesh and blood, he also took part of the same." The son of Mary, therefore, was essentially human, and his name was called Jesus.

.But the son of Mary, by an interchange of appellations, is also called the "Son of God." I say by an interchange of appellations; for neither the character of that humanity, nor the mode by which it took its existence, entitles it, any more than Adam, to be designated the Son of God. But if it be replied that both are so called, this of itself is sufficient to show that in respect to Christ it is not chiefly in view of the reason above stated, because this would make it no longer true that he is the only begotten Son of God, which he is declared to be. Both Calvin and Watson maintain that the title "Son of God" is a personal designation of the Divine nature, and that the Sonship was just as much a fact before the incarnation as after it-that Jesus was called the son of God, not because of the miraculous conception, but on account of the Deity and eternal existence of the Logos which was incarnated. And this view of the question is well sustained by the fact that neither Jesus nor his disciples ever claimed that he was the Son of God on the ground of the miraculous conception. In regard to Christ, it was a fact he never mentioned; and in respect to the disciples, they doubtless were ignorant of it; for this was one of the things which Mary kept and pondered secretly in her heart. It has been held by some that Luke i, 35, "The

Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God," proves that the title "Son " was given to Christ, either with reference to the miraculous conception of the human nature, or with reference to the act of incarnation. But it should be remembered that he was called the Son of God because the power of the Highest overshadowed the virgin, which is distinct from the fact that his humanity was formed in her womb immediately by God. Mr. Watson holds that the effect of this overshadowing would be the assumption of humanity by the divine. ⚫ nature of him who is, in that nature, the Son; but that he is so called, not because a divine person assumed humanity, but because that divine person was antecedently the Son of God.

The doctrine of the Logos is clearly stated by John. Of his discourse on this subject the following may be taken as a correct syllabus: "The Logos was in the beginning, was with God, and was God; and the Logos was made flesh and dwelt among us." Here are two facts distinctly stated, namely: 1. The essential divinity of a pre-existent person called the Logos; and, 2. That this Logos was made flesh. To fathom the first is to fathom divinity and determine the conditions of existence that is underived and that never began to be. The explication of the second will fall more properly under another division of the subject.

The doctrine of Christ seems to be stated in these words: "The Logos was made flesh"-"God was manifest in the flesh." The word made in the first thesis evidently is qualified and limited by the word manifest in the second. For the divinity was no more made flesh according to the usual acceptation of the word, than the flesh was made divinity. To lose either nature in the other is to fail of the end proposed in the union of the two. We conclude, therefore, that the words "made flesh" and "manifest in the flesh" denote that inexplicable union in one person of the Godhead and manhoodof the Son of God and the son of Mary. And I will assume that this person is not so well represented by any other name as that of Christ. "Son of God," it is true, is a personal designation of the divine nature, and as appropriate after the incarnation as before it, and no more so; and hence it is, per

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