IV. It only remains for us to bring distinctly to mind one other consideration of the most serious importance, which connects itself with all the preceding. It is, that we are acting, not merely for this life; but that God has made our condition. through the whole of our future existence to depend upon ourselves; upon the characters, which we may form and possess. The course which we here commence, the habits which we here acquire, do not terminate with the present life. Our virtues and vices will pass with us into eternity, and constitute hereafter our happiness, or misery. Death will give us no new preparation for that state to which it introduces us. Our proficiency in virtue is the measure of our qualification for the happiness of the future life. If the soul be immortal,' I quote the words which Plato represents Socrates as having uttered on the day of his death, If the soul be immortal, it requires our greatest care, not merely for the present portion of time, which we call life, but for the whole of time; and the danger may well appear dreadful if we neglect it. If, indeed, death were a dissolution of the whole man, it might be a gain for the bad to die; and with the loss of the soul to be released from the body and from their vices. But now, since it appears that the soul is immortal, there is no other escape from evil, there is no other safety, except in becoming as good and wise as possible. For the soul will arrive at the place of the departed, having nothing, but the instruction and discipline which she has here received.' This is a translation of one of the finest passages which has been left us by any of the ancient philosophers of Greece. It would be painful to explain with how much error, thoughts so noble were connected. But the voice which reason uttered in her secret chambers, or in the cell of a prison, to her few disciples, revelation has since made audible to mankind. The truths, which reason in her highest aspirings, when she approached near the confines of inspiration, saw dimly, and most imperfectly, in the distance, have since been disclosed in full splendour. There is nothing more certain, than that the stronger and more habitual is the influence of these truths on our conduct, the wiser we shall be, and the better, and the happier.

For the Examiner.

LIBERAL OPINIONS OF THE QUARTERLY REVIEW.

It is refreshing to find in this able work such frequent concessions as we do, to the great principles of liberality and freedom of inquiry, which are every where advancing with mighty strides. The writer of this communication formerly pointed out one or two instances of such a spirit in that journal to the Editor of the Unitarian Miscellany. He is happy to increase the catalogue by referring at present to an admirably lucid and candid article, in the 63d number of the Quarterly Review, on Niebuhr's Roman History. Although Unitarians are not expressly named, yet they have to thank the Reviewer for the kindliness with which he has taken their parts by intimations and hints that are not to be mistaken. The passage alluded to is the following:-It occurs after mention had been made of an opinion entertained by Niebuhr that mankind descended not from one original pair, but that different breeds of men were originally created in different countries.

There is, or at least there was, a class of persons in this country, who, on meeting with such opinions as that which we have quoted from Niebuhr's history, overwhelm the author at once with a sweeping charge of "German folly and infidelity.". But "folly and infidelity," whether of English or German growth, have never been more unsuccessfully combated than by such opponents. "To make a man an offender for a word," is condemned by the highest authority; if there be any who are tempted to tax Niebuhr with deism or infidelity, because he does not believe the descent of all mankind from two first parents; we would recommend them to consider well the admirable passage in Johnson's Life of Sir Thomas Browne, in which he defends the subject of his Memoir from a similar imputation, and points out the want of wisdom as well as of charity in those who are willing on slight grounds "to enlarge the catalogue of infidels." We are, certainly, very far from agreeing with the opinions of Niebuhr; and we sincerely lament errors, which, in such a man, can only proceed from a want of duly weighing the grounds of belief, and studying the scriptures in a teachable and hum

ble spirit; but we think that a German may very possibly be a sincere believer in the gospel, without having fully considered how closely the truth of the Jewish revelation is connected with that of the christian, and even without allowing the inspiration of Scripture in a sense so universal, as that in which we ourselves take it. There is, naturally enough, something of a national character in the manner and degree of men's faith; and it has often been remarked that the German school of theology has a tendency to latitudinarianism : its divines are apt to explain away some of the most forcible scriptural expressions, and to introduce hypotheses of their own, without sufficiently reflecting on the consequences involved in the sacrifice of the plain statements of the Bible to the removal of some merely imaginary difficulty. Such men, however, and men who grow up at their feet, and imbibe their habits of thinking, are not to be therefore inconsiderately branded with want of Christian belief: the appellation of infidel belongs with far greater propriety to many writers on whom it has never been bestowed; to a whole multitude of dramatists, novelists, essayists, and others, who, while speaking respectfully of the doctrines of christianity, have inculcated practical principles in direct opposition to the spirit of the gospel. When, indeed, another German writer* expresses his envy of the happiness of the ancient Greeks because they had never heard the name of Israel, and when we find him in the same volume speaking with triumphant delight of an act of assassination; such a man betrays the true character of unbelief, accompanied, as it always is, with moral depravity. But there are no principles in Niebuhr's work which afford grounds for any similar accusation against him. In fact, if we would hope to restrain that wildness of criticism on theological subjects which is too prevalent in Germany, we must learn to tolerate amongst ourselves a sober freedom of honest and humble inquiry; our censures, at present, lose some of their weight as proceeding from a national school too little accustomed to question old opinions to be able fairly to judge when they are questioned without reason. skepticism of pride or ignorance or wickedness is sufficiently The abundant; but this can never lead to truth. We believe

that the inquiring spirit of the Germans is of a better kind; and while we sincerely wish to see it purified from its extravagances, we think that this may be most successfully effected, if we acknowledge, and endeavour to imitate its excellencies.' G.

GREEK ARTICLE.

SOME time ago, a great sensation was produced in the theological community, by the publications of Mr Sharp and Dr Middleton, on this subject. These publications derived their chief importance from a rule, which these authors supposed to establish the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus beyond the possibility of doubt. A note of triumph was sounded in this country, and the work of Middleton was republished, with a flaming preface by Dr Mason, in which he observes, that the author is entitled to the gratitude of all who love the gospel of Jesus, for his successful labours in rescuing fundamental truths from the bold perversion, and the licentious criticism, of those vital corruptions of christianity-Unitarian improvements.'

Middleton's rule is on p. 44 of the American edition, § 2. 'When two or more attributives, joined by a copulative or copulatives, are assumed of the same person or thing, before the first attributive the article is inserted; before the remaining ones it is omitted.' And in p. 48, he maintains, that the converse of the rule is true; and that when the article is prefixed to the first only of such attributives, they are assumed of the same subject.' According to this rule, Middleton would render Tit. ii. 13, Του μεγάλου Θεον ΚΑΙ σωτηρος ημων Ιησου Χριστου, ' of our great God and Saviour, Jesus Christ,' instead of the common and correct rendering, of the great God, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ.' The doctrine of Middleton was proved to be unsound by several scholars, particularly by the Rev. Calvin Winstanley. Since the publication of Mr Winstanley's tract, we have not heard so much of the support which the doctrine of the trinity derives from the use of the Greek article; and learned Trinitarians

are probably by this time convinced, that Middleton's doctrine of the article is rather unsafe ground on which to rest their cause. We are confirmed in this opinion by the circumstance, that in Winer's Grammar of the New Testament, a valuable work, recently translated from the German, and published under the patronage of Professor Stuart, of Andover, a rule is established entirely subversive of the famous one of Sharp and Middleton. It is on p. 54, Rule 5th. When two or three definite nouns of like number and gender follow each other, usually the first only has the article.' Of course, when the article is prefixed to the first of two or more nouns following each other, it is only requisite that these words should be of the same gender and number; and not that they should relate to the same person or subject.

MILTON ON THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST.

[While this number of our Journal is passing through the press, the newly recovered Treatise of Milton on the Christian Doctrine, is published at the University Press by the Booksellers of this city. As this work has excited considerable attention, and especially because of the report that the author dissents from the doctrine of the Trinity and shows himself to be a Unitarian of the Arian School, we have thought it would be acceptable to our readers to cite a few passages from which they may judge of his opinions from his own language-premising only, that what we shall quote may serve rather to increase their desire to read the whole treatise than satisfy them.]

Since, however, Christ not only bears the name of the only begotten Son of God, but is also several times called in Scripture God, notwithstanding the universal doctrine that there is but one God, it appeared to many, who had no mean opinion of their own acuteness, that there was an inconsistency in this; which gave rise to an hypothesis no less strange than repugnant to reason, namely, that the Son, although personally and numerically another, was yet essentially one with the Father, and that thus the unity of God was preserved.

But unless the terms unity and duality be signs of the same ideas to God which they represent to men, it would have