The Spiritual Temple of the Spiritual God; being the substance of Sermons preached in the English Church, Dresden. By Rev. C. H. H. WRIGHT, M.A. London: Nisbet and Co. THE sermons in this volume are eight in number, and we give their titles at length: The Cleansing of the Temple; The Transfiguration and its lessons; The Humiliation and Exaltation of the Lord Jesus; The enemies of the Lord and the Lord's Decree; The Spirit's work in Regeneration; The Time for seeking Salvation; The Consecration of the Temple; The Polishing of the Temple Stones, or the Causes of Affliction as set forth in the Book of Job. Mr. Wright is a valued and learned contributor of ours, but we are happy to meet him in the more directly practical character of a preacher. His theology is substantially evangelical, but his critical habits enable him to handle his subjects in a clear and original manner. His sermons have a freshness and unction about them which assure us of his profound personal convictions, and which qualify him to speak powerfully to the heart and conscience. As might be expected he is liberal and comprehensive in many of his views, and he consequently will be specially appreciated by enlightened and intelligent Christians. The discourses as a whole are of a superior order, and there are in them many very forcible and even admirable passages. Where there is so much that is excellent it is needless to point out individual discourses; we may observe, however, that in the very able sermon on Job the author has introduced a number of learned notes which sufficiently attest his skill in sacred criticism. The Awakening of Italy and the Crisis of Rome. By Rev. J. A. WYLIE, LL.D. London: Religious Tract Society. THIS book is partly historical, partly descriptive, and partly anticipatory. It is written in an agreeable style, and a decidedly evangelical spirit, by an author who is intimately acquainted with Italy and Italian matters. A wonderful amount of valuable and important information is crowded into its pages, and we imagine there are few who will read it without profit. The revelations it makes are startling enough, and shew that from a religious point of view Italy has peculiar claims upon our regard and sympathy. We sincerely trust the volume will be widely circulated and do much good. The Necessary Existence of God. By W. H. GILLESPIE, Esq. Fourth Edition. London: Houlston and Wright.. The Argument, à priori, for the Moral Attributes of God. By W. H. GILLESPIE. Edinburgh: Nimmo. WE had hoped to give something like an adequate representation of the course pursued in these two works, but have been prevented by the excessive demand made on our space by Articles. Probably the Atheist was never more firmly grappled with on à priori grounds than in these two works. Human reason can scarcely hope to come nearer to a de monstration than Mr. Gillespie has come. His first book has been much elaborated since it originally appeared; but the one on the Moral Attributes is a recent publication. We should like to see a formal refutation of these works from the pen of a secularist. This, however, is not to be hoped for, as the party is more mighty in denunciation, ridicule and obscene blasphemy than in logic and philosophy, or the honest pursuit of truth. Hieroclis Synecdemus, et Notitia Græcæ Episcopatuum: accedunt Nili Doxapatrii notitia Patriarchatuum et Locorum nomina immutata. G. PARTHEY. Beralini. IT will be sufficient to enter here for the benefit of learned students of ancient Church history, the title of this erudite compilation. To the Greek texts Latin versions are appended, and there is a complete index to all the names of places, with other useful materials. The Biblical Criticism of the Glasgow Presbytery criticized. By a Chapel Minister; with preface by NORMAN MACLEOD, D.D. Glasgow: Maclehose. THIS is a brief and somewhat clever pamphlet on the side of Dr. Macleod in a controversy which may cause great changes in Scotland on the Sabbath question. Visible Unity. A Letter to the Venerable Archdeacon Wordsworth, D.D. By SENEX. London: Hatchard and Co. We think Dr. Pusey has in his Eirenicon pronounced an eternal sentence against Rome as it is while pleading for union with it. Henceforth no man need go ignorantly to Rome. Dr. Pusey is the great puzzle of our Age: we cannot possibly understand how he has or ever had an atom of hope that he should promote equal communion with Rome by his recent remarkable book. What would our Jewels and Halls and Chillingworths and Stillingfleets, say to such a phenomenon! Without going into details, we may, however, remind our readers, that in 1704 a book appeared called "An Essay towards a proposal for Catholic Communion, etc. By a Minister of the Church of England.” This work is of doubtful authorship, but its whole drift is to shew that the English and Romish Churches do not differ essentially. Like all such essays it is artful and prejudiced; and of course left the two Churches as far asunder as ever. This will be the case now. Senex need not fear the continuance of the tide towards Rome: it must ebb. The_Pestilence: why Inflicted; its duration and desolating character. By JAMES BIDEN. Gosport: Legg. MR. BIDEN has invented an exposition of many texts of Scripture, quite different in some of its details from aught we were before acquainted with. He should really be dissuaded, if it can be, from publishing any more such nonsense. The man is under an hallucina tion, e.g. "He is called by name Biden (a sheep two years old, fit for sacrifice), a Latin inscription over the King of the Jews; in Saxon, endurance, tenacity." And a few lines further on: "From the bowels of his mother mention is made of his name-Messum, her maiden name being the Hebrew plural form, the Messiah, anointed (Isaiah xlix. 1)," (p. 7). We hope the author of La Littérature des Fous will hear of this pamphlet before he publishes another edition. On the other hand, Mrs. Elizabeth Cottle might study Mr. Biden's pages with advantage. Doth God take care for Oxen? A Sermon before the University. The Law of Christian Charity. A Sermon. By E. LANGDON, B.A. Oxford and London: Parker and Co. A GOOD sermon, cast in the mould of a liberal and healthy spirit. We have received and beg to call attention to the following :— Five Years in Kent Street; or, Intelligence from a Missionary Station in London. By Rev. James Amos, M.A. Correspondence des Réformateurs dans les Pays de Langues Française, edited with notes by A. L. Herminjard. Vol. I. The January number of The Pulpit Analyst. Colonial Church Chronicle. The Koran and the Bible; or, Islam and Christianity. By J. M. Arnold, B.D. Second Edition. Longmans. Corrections of Copies of New Testament portion of the Vat. MS. By H. Heinfetter. London: Evans. Schola Syriaca complectens Chrestomathiam cum apparatu grammatico et Lexicon Chrestomathiæ Accommodatum. J. B. Wenig. Pars I. Chrestom. cum Appar. Gram. London: Williams and Norgate. Histoire Critique des Livres de l'Ancien Testament, par A. Kuenen. Translated by M. A. Pierson; with a Preface by E. Renan. Tom. I. Historical Books. Paris. Geschichte der Apostel. von Tode Jesu bis zur Zerstörung Jerusalems. By Dr. Sepp. Second Ed. with Introd. Schaffhausen. Vorlesungen über die Christliche Dogmengeschichte. Von F. C. Baur. Das Dogma der Alten Kirche. Part II. Synod of Nicea to the end of Sixth Century. Edited by F. F. Baur. Leipsic. Handbuch der Kirchengeschichte. Von H. E. F. Guericke. Ninth Edition. Vol. I. Leipsic. Commentarius Perpetuus in Jacobi Epistolam. By H. Bouman. Utrecht. Die Wunderthaten des Herrn in Bezug auf die neueste Kritik, betrachtet von F. L. Steinmeyer. Berlin: Wiegandt und Grieben. NEW SERIES.-VOL. IX., NO. XVII. Ꭱ MISCELLANIES. 66 Discoveries of M. de Rossi in the Catacombs.-We must not omit another remarkable discovery of M. de Rossi in these catacombs; the name of one who with many of his readers will rival in interest even martyr popes. The same kind of authorities which guided M. de Rossi in his adventurous, dare we use the coarse and profane word, diggings" for buried Popes, led him to expect to find the name of S. Cæcilia in the same hallowed crypt. And so in due time S. Cæcilia reveals herself in distinct letters. We cannot fully trace out in our pages the course of this discovery; we are rather disposed to follow up with M. de Rossi a train of thought which might tend to throw some light on a most interesting question. Of its success we will not absolutely despair, as he does not despair. We would fain know the process by which some at least of the older and more famous names in Heathen, and Republican or Imperial Rome, passed over into the ranks of the Christians. On the whole it is clear to us, we think that it is beyond doubt, that the old noble families remained in general to the end the most obstinate Pagans. Men with the virtues as well as the birth and descent of old Rome (Milman's History of Christianity, iii., 80, 81); men like Vettius Prætextatus, were the hope and strength of the Pagan party. Paganism in that class did not expire till all the older and nobler families were scattered over the face of the world, after the ruin of Rome by Alaric and by Genseric. But there can be no doubt that many of them had already forsaken the Jove of the Capitol for the Cross of Christ. (Jerome's writings are conclusive for his period.) M. de Rossi observes that Cornelius is the only pope who bears what he calls the diacritic name of one of the famous Gentes. Above the Catacomb of Callistus stands, or rather seems nodding to its fall, a huge mound, or ruined structure, manifestly one of the vast and costly monuments which in Heathen days lined the Appian Way. What if this was a monument of the Cæcilii, built on an estate belonging to that noble family? What if S. Cæcilia was descended from this illustrious race?-what if the estate had passed into the hands of Christian Cæcilii, and given a right and title, or at least furnished a free and lawful access to the subjacent catacomb ? All this, we admit, is extremely visionary; but as an acknowledged vision may perhaps be indulged till disproved-it can hardly be fully confirmed -by later investigations. No one is more sensible than M. de Rossi of the difficulties which encumber, and which we fear must encumber, such questions: "Ma nelle tenebre che coprono le genealogie durante il secolo dell' impero, nel mescolamento delle stirpi e de' gentilizi, in mezzo a tanti nomini nuovi, innalzati dai principi ai supremi onori, è impossibile di veder chiaro, e dai soli nomi argomentare con sicurezza legami genealogici od ereditarii.” Is there not the further and perhaps more serious difficulty, in the assumption of, or permission to assume noble and gentilitian names, by Freedmen and Libertini ? Persecution after the reign of Decius was not unknown, especially under Valerian, in which occurred the martyrdom of Pope Sixtus II.; but it was intermittent, not more than local, till the final conflict under Diocletian. The late Cardinal Wiseman, it is well known, with his characteristic prudence, laid the scene of his romance of "Fabiola ” in the reign of Diocletian, when above two centuries had matured and completed all the arrangements for Christian burial in the catacombs; when the Christians were perhaps driven to take refuge in these vast and unexplored depths, and really became what they have been fondly and foolishly declared, or suggested, or hinted to have been, lucifuga. The Catacombs may in those dark days of calamity have become places of worship, even worship of martyrs, whose holy example the pious fugitives might at any time be called upon to follow. It is certainly a whimsical sign of the times that a grave Cardinal, in the fulness of his cardinalate, should have bowed to the all-ruling influence of novelwriting, and condescended to cast the doctrines of his Church into this attractive, it should seem almost indispensable, form. A Pope of old, and a very clever Pope, wrote a novel, but it was in his younger days of lay-hood; and if he heartily repented of the Boccacio tone of his novel, he still hung with parental fondness over the elegance of its Latinity. Let us hasten to say that the Cardinal's romance (this is not mere respect for the departed) was not only altogether irreproachable, and in harmony with his stainless and serious character, but, if it had not been too didactic, its avowed but fatal aim, it might have enjoyed a wider and more lasting popularity. But the persecution of Diocletian is far less clearly illustrated than we might have expected from the study of the Catacombs. There is an obscurity which has not yet been dispersed, nor seems likely to be dispersed, over the acts and the fate of the Popes who at that period ruled in Rome. There are no years, from the very earliest in the Papal annals, so utterly obscure as those of Pope Marcellinus, A.D. 296-307. During the reign of Diocletian the great persecution commenced, Feb. 23, A.D. 303. It began and raged most fiercely in the East. Maximian ruled in the West, and in Rome. Diocletian appeared there to celebrate his Vicennalia, but soon departed. For Marcellinus himself, he was arraigned by the earlier Christian writers as an apostate who offered sacrifice to Cæsar. But this, as well as the fable of the Council of 300 Bishops of Sinuessa, is rejected by the later and better writers of the Church of Rome. But Marcellinus, as all agree, was no martyr. Where he was buried we know not. There is of course no vestage of him, nor, we believe, of his successor, Marcellus, in the Catacombs. The whole history in truth is a blank; even legend is modest. With the cessation of the persecution the Church of Rome resumed, of course, with her other rights or immunities, the possession of her places of sepulture. But it appears that, on the triumph and supremacy of Christianity, the Roman Christians began in some degree and gra |