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WILSON ON CATHOLICITY. Catholicity Spiri...
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MRS. BROWNING'S POEMS. Poems. By Elizabe...
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Ropul.Ar Law. A Popular Lecture On Law, ...
they may know exactly what to expect as its punishments . Lawmakers were the greatest of mankind . It would not be too much to say , that lawmakers ranked before moral philosophers , founders of religion , the poet or prophet , and the historian of society . Often , however , all characters were incorporated in the one to give effect to the law . Seldom did the lawmaker rest without claiming the authority of heaven , and asserting his laws to be divine as well as human . Men made laws for themselves to regulate
their conduct , and from analogy , discovered the laws of physical science . Not only the laws of heaven and earth , regulating the universe by the experience of mankind , were found and laid down by reason intermingled with fancy ; but the relations supposed to exist between man and his Maker from the beginning to the end , were the imaginations of the law . There was good and there was evil ; there was the right and the wrong ; there were those who kept to the law and those who disobeyed its directions ; rewards
for virtue and punishment for crime in heaven as well as earth . Besides the natural laws of good and evil , determining the measure of happiness and unhappiness to societies and individuals , there were allegories and mythologies of the original inhabitants of the earth transgressing laws imposed upon them direct from heaven , some of which not only brought upon them , direct punishment , but accounted for evil and misery throughout all future generations as the results of the sins of their forefathers . The sacrifices
of beasts and men , atonements , propitiations , penances and sufferings , were imposed upon themselves by mankind in punishment for the contraventions of the laws of God . The scheme of law has been transferred to heaven , and in lieu of all sinners , the death of one innocent was accepted . Nevertheless , the transgression of the law upon earth was still visited in after life by punishments more or less severe , purgatorial and perpetual . Christianity , especially the Roman version of it , has in hell a system of punishment in the extent of its torture unknown to the ancients or
any other theological justice in the world . Until the last and present century the supposed theology of justice and divine law seemed to have inspired the actual and present in rivalry with its future ferocity . There were very few offences which were not visited by death , the ultimatum in this world , and perpetual hell in the other . Joseph II ., of Austria , who was not supposed to take his law and justice from the Church , repealed capital punishment for all offences , even murder , which we believe , still remains in force
in Austria . The code of Akbar , the Mahommcdan , founded on the Hindoo , still extant in India , in its mildness might well have put to the blush the Christian conquerors of that pen nsula . Simultaneously with the amelioration of codes on the Continent was a theological scepticism which ignored the scriptural interpretation of the severity of future punishments . With us , in England , the Church in the person of a general reformer , Archbishop Whateley ,
and many other Dissenters , in association with the revision of our earthly penal code , endeavoured to show , from the Old and New Testaments , that there were no such punishments for the body in a future state as had been imagined in perpetual hell torments , and had been practised in this life by the churches . Among the most remarkable of works to this effect was White ' s Life in Christ , and there is a Magazine on our table dedicated to the propagation of the more merciful belief . Frederick the Great
ameliorated the laws of Prussia ; at the same time some zealous minister of religion gained obloquy from bigots by preaching a reform in opinion as to future punishments . It is related of Frederick , as an anecdote to the point , by the sticklers of old usages , who esteem the ( military effect of infernal torments to the fullest extent , that ho said , on hearing of it , u Let them bo damned if they like it . " It might be as "well to show
the penal code of eternal hell , and the duration of purgatory attached to mortal and venial sins by the infallible Koman Catholic Church , and which , therefore , can never bo amended . Lord Shaftesbury said worshippers might be known by their worship ; and , therefore , without any bigotry , we may imagine for the future what we have experienced—the results of such a heavenly code , did the ecclesiastical have a fresh lease of power over tho temporal .
Ihero is a law which in revelations , interpretations , legislations of law , divine and human , becomes forgotten and orusi'd . Ihis law is the supremo court of jurisdiction which should try all other laws . It is a revelation which preceded all other revelations , and
by which they are tried . Leading upwards to divinity , and derived from divinity , it is common to all humanity . This is the law of the human heart , moral conscience , or in legal phraseology , perhaps , may be termed equity . The uniformity observed among the lawgivers of all nations , in their codes and moral interpretations , seems to affirm a- common origin of truth and common result , loving good , fearing evil , and loving your neighbour as yourself . Professor Maurice , of King ' s College , from the
concordance in laws , morals , and philosophy throughout the world , wherever any systematized procedure has been established , concludes that all nations so circumstanced have had a divine teacher . Analogy from the material universe may enlighten us as to the operations of the human mind . If , as the author of the Vestiges of Creation , supposes , the progress of the universe has been developed by laws of nature without the imminent agency of divinity , may we not more readily believe what has been confirmed by
experience , that law had its growth in humanity , individually and socially , preceding revelations and not arising from direct inspiration . Cicero and Macintosh , and nearly all writers on the law , are obliged to acknowledge , in enquiring into its origin , a law of nature . They agree that , without it , the individual would have been destroyed , society would never have been established , — self-preservation dictated measures
against the annihilation of the species . As the universe without order would not be , so without order mankind could not exist . As the Creator is represented establishing a law of good , which could not be without comparison of bad , when it is said of everything that he saw that it was good , so there is primarily in the heart of man a standard of good by which everything is to be tried whether for good or evil .
880 &$$ 3leahet+ Saturday,
880 & $$ 3 LeaHet + Saturday ,
Wilson On Catholicity. Catholicity Spiri...
WILSON ON CATHOLICITY . Catholicity Spiritual and Intellectual . An attempt to vindicate the Harmony of Faith and Knowledge . A Series of Discourses by Thomas Wilson , M . A ., hite minister of St . Peter ' s Mancroft , Norwich . No . II . John Chapman . We noticed the first of these eloquent and thoughtful discourses some time ago ; the publication of the second furnishes us with an extract or two we are glad to place before our readers . Mr . Thomas Wilson was a minister of the Church—his independent mind has led him beyond the shadow of the ancient cathedral , out into the sunshine of the universe at large . To drop metaphor he has passed to the camp of the Spiritualists , desiring Catholicity not dogmatism in religion . HEAL CATHOLICITY . ? ' There ran be no bond of peace , and no unity of spirit , without Catholic charity and communion with every nation under heaven , where men worship God with reverence and righteousness , according to their knowledge . To attain this one result , without which faith and knowledge combined are in the Christian balance nothing worth , the churches must cease to propound debateable questions touching dogmatic schemes and scholastic tenets , as inexorable Shibboleths of heaven and hell between man and man , Questions of-words and names , of opinion and conjecture , of learning and research , of anise and cumine , must be paled off from the eternal , unchangeable , and universal principles of the spiritual law , the weightier matters of justice , mercy , and faith ; brightened by the divinest of the abiding three , the grace that never fails , the grace after God ' s own heart , trusting all things , hoping all things , believing all things—for the best , whose most excellent name and way , both in heaven and earth , is charity . " The views we have so often put forth in our columns respecting Protestantism , thus moot with his agreement : — OLI > AND NEW ritOTESTANTlSM . * ' This idea of limiting man ' s communion with his Maker to a stereotyped edition of llevelntions , verified and expounded by much learning , has reached its climax under the phase of Church history , which is called Protestantism , marking the momentous and magnificent epoch of the sixteenth century . In order to shake off tho heavy yoke of the Papacy , the Lutheran insurgents indignantly , righteously , and successfully spurned the priestly usurpation of a spiritual l <' athership on Earth . The disciples of tho Reformation owed their safety and victory to a Democratic denial of priesthood , and a popular vindication of the rights of private judgment . Tney refused to acknowledge or tolerate any human mediatorial agency , whether sacrificial or prophetic , between man and his Maker . They utterly and contemptuously repudiated nil claims to collective or individual infallibility on the part of Ecclesiastical Councils or their Episcopal Chief , as declaratory channels from the Almighty . Thus was achieved a great triumph towards the recognition and establishment of tho dynasty > of the Inner Kingdom , for the Churches that had defeated the Roman hierarchy by invoking private judgment ngainst Corporate Iiabbinism could not themselves set up the
pretension they had repudiated . Such was the -work good and great as far as it went , of the German Remonstrants , but , like every other human achievement , poor partial , and inadmissible if rashly put forth as final ! The condition of life , physical , intellectual , or spiritual * is movement ; we must keep moving , one way or the other , till we cease to be . The rational and faithful continuation of the Teutonic protest against the corporate investment of spiritual oracles in any ecclesiastical priesthood , is the recognition of God ' s * Inner Kingdom , ' as entrusted to the delegated rule and empowered sufficiency of every humble and faithful disciple . * ' The Protestantism of the modern churches has
attempted to take up a half-way position between a special Judaic priesthood of caste and class , and the royal Christian priesthood of a peculiar People individually zealous of good works . It has repudiated the pretension to mediation between God and man , but has at the same time declared all divine knowledge to be kept in a casket of which it holds the key . It has made book-lore the arbiter of eternal life . or death , and has wound up the interests of immortality in a web of criticism which its own fingers can alone unravel . The unlettered suitor for his soul ' s salvation must plead his cause before a stern tribunal of forensic theology ; he must be prepared for questions of authentic authorship , genuine
manuscript , and correct interpretation ; he must be versed in the languages , customs , nationalities , and localities of ancient times ; must be qualified , in short , for the solution of physical and metaphysical problems , demanding the rarest combination of natural ability and acquired knowledge , with all the means and appliances of health , and wealth . Protestantism has thus referred the soul ' s heritage of faith , hope , and charity , to an incompetent and unauthorized tribunal ; it has ignored the constitution and thwarted the jurisdictions of the Inner Kingdom , by refusing to render to the spirit the things that are spiritual and to the understanding the things that are intellectual . "
We close our extracts with this , showing a clergyman's opiniox op the bible . " As Protestants -we must cherish the Bible , but not worship it ; the soul must do with it as with the net to which the Kingdom of Heaven is likened in the Gospel , —must choose the good , cast away the bad , and neglect the indifferent ; far like the net , the Bible has gathered of every kind . They of old said thus and thus for the hardness of men ' s hearts , —an eye for an eye , a tooth for a tooth , curse for curse , and blood for blood , —but in the beginning it was not so , neither shall be in the end , but Alpha and Omega shall be the eternal truth proclaimed by Christ in words of spirit and of life , ' I say unto you
otherwise , be not ye overcome of Evil , but overcome Evil with Good . ' To maintain that the Bible is one book , containing but one doctrine , and no error , is either ignorance , or prejudice , or falsehood . It consists of books written in different ages by men with different measures of inspiration , from the fulness of the Godhead bodily to the ordinary capacity of ordinary authors . Its doctrines vary from the extreme of the narrowest Judaism to that of the most expansive and divine Christianity . Its spiritual errors are confuted line upon line , precept upon precept , by itself , as it puts away childish manhood in the
things , and rises to the stature of perfect teacher come from God . But its truth is the perfect wisdom of the spirit , making men wise unto salvation ; it never enters upon the domain of intellectual learning and philosophy : it never aims at making men wise unto science ; its physical theories are the popular errors of its time , —intelligible errors more useful than unintelligible facts , —for practer-natural meddling with such matters would have been to mar the mind ' s mission , forestalling its work , and quenching its fire . To define faith , therefore , as belief in the plenary or literal inspiration of the Bible , can only be excused on the score of ignorance or prejudice . "
Mrs. Browning's Poems. Poems. By Elizabe...
MRS . BROWNING ' S POEMS . Poems . By Elizabeth Barrett Browning . New edition . In two volumes . Chapman and Hall . ( Second Notice . ) " O that I were young and handsome ! " exclaimed Hector Berlioz , in one of his spirituel feuilletons ; " I would make Alboni desperately in love with me , ill treat her , and in six months she would be the greatest singer in the world . "
Something of that artistic ferocity we feel towards Elizabeth Barrett Browning . Alboni has not a more peerless gift from Nature , nor a greater need for the glorious baptism of suffering . The godlike power of song has been bestowed upon her ; bxit she has little to sing . Por solemn psalms and silver litanies , for playful wanderings of fancy and the delicate delights of reverie , she has a finely-toned organ , and can play such themes with " ravishing division" ; fill her soul with the gathered stores of experience , and she will pour them forth in eloquent music ; but , mea nwhile , her playing is like that of a great artist , who preludes the composition of some noble work by running his fingers over the keys to try the capabilities of the
instrument . For power of expression—the genuine musicnl utterance of emotion—she has scarcely a rival living . But on closing the second volume , and taking a survey of the contents , we cannot help regarding the present collection as poetic exorcises rather than as lasting poems . Compared with her contemporaries
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 7, 1850, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_07121850/page/16/
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