6

us this day our daily bread,' the choir answers in the name of the congregation, Which is Thyself, O CHRIST.' In the Mosarabic Missal the Rubric directs, that when the priest comes to these words' Panem nostrum quotidianum,' he shall turn to the people, and taking the paten into his hands, show the sacred bread, the Body of our Blessed LORD, to the congregation." To ourselves, the otherwise inexplicable convertibility of the terms oσ105, supersubstantialis, quotidianus, coupled with the privileged and restricted use of the LORD's Prayer among early Christians, always appears strong, because apparently undesigned, corroborative evidence in favour both of the doctrine of the transcendental nature of the Blessed Sacrament, and of the Catholic practice of daily celebration.

We have not sufficient space left to quote at length from the text itself of Mr. Denton's Commentary. We have great satisfaction, however, in commending it to all classes of readers, as very perfect and excellent of its kind throughout, both in the devotional treatment of the several petitions of the Prayer, and in the prefatory exposition of its general structure and intention. We do not, however, altogether agree with him as to the little value he is disposed to ascribe to the very common opinion, which has obtained among commentators, that our Blessed LORD selected particular expressions from the worship of the synagogues, and united them in this one prayer; a supposition, he says, which "receives but little support from fact." He himself gives the original passages and authorities from which each petition is supposed to be so derived; and for our own part, we have been accustomed to regard the supposition as a prime instance of what must be considered an universal law and principle of Catholic devotion, which led our LORD so often in His prayers and discourses to quote the very words of the Psalms and Prophets of the Old Testament; and the Blessed Virgin in the Magnificat to give vent to her deepest emotions of holy joy, almost in Hannah's song of thanksgiving; and the author of the Te Deum to string together, as a chain of pearls, some of the choicest sayings of Holy Scripture; which is in short the fundamental rationale of all Christian Liturgies, and of the Christian use of the Psalms and Canticles, and of every form of prayer, and what is especially to the purpose, of the LORD's Prayer itself.

REVIEWS AND NOTICES.

An Answer to Professor Goldwin Smith's Plea for the Abolition of Tests in the University of Oxford. By the Rev. H. R. BRAMLEY, M.A., Fellow and Tutor of S. Mary Magdalen College. (Rivingtons.) PROFESSOR Smith fortunately does not possess much influence in Oxford. As a clear and vigorous writer he is known in certain political circles in England, through the columns of one of the Radical newspapers, and still more probably in America. A much deeper thinker, of course, than Dean Stanley, he would not know how to lay himself out, as Dean Stanley during his academical residence notoriously did, for captivating young men, and (we mean, of course, through his lectures exclusively,) such of the other sex as liked the excitement of a promiscuous assembly; and if he could, he would disdain no doubt to do so.

It is well, however, perhaps, that his most violent and audacious Pamphlet should not go altogether unrebuked, for it is really disgraceful, that one living on the endowment of a Church university, should give utterance to sentiments so utterly opposed to her teaching and constitution.

We have already by anticipation replied to the general tenour of Mr. Smith's arguments. Our Article on 66 Cook's Sermons," and the following extracts, sufficiently indicate the Professor's views. Speaking of religious scepticism, he writes thus,

"It is here because it is every where, both in England and in other countries, owing to the decay of State Creeds, which, not being true, and being no longer upheld by sufficient power, are falling into ruin, and leaving nations, whose religious thought they have long paralyzed, weltering in perplexity and distress."-P. 20.

And, again, of men of science he considers that they

"would be sinners against the light that is in them, if they did not recoil from mere absurdities, particularly when tendered in a damnatory form, and stamped as falsehoods to all uncorrupted minds by their connexion with a spirit of persecution."-Pp. 27, 28.

This is the way in which the Creeds are spoken of. The views of the anti-dogmatists appear just to amount to this. "Doubtless, there is such a thing as Truth, and after it persons are going on perpetually seeking. But it is a very subtle impalpable essence, and do not suppose that you will ever grasp it; because the moment you express it in words, (be they Creeds or Articles,) it ceases to be Truth." In other words, they affirm that GOD merely mocks us, and in seeking after Truth, we are following a Will of the Wisp, and nothing more.

Mr. Bramley well illustrates the folly of thinking it necessary to doubt-as Messrs. Stanley and Smith advise-by the well known apologue of the man who would not believe in the virtue of his wife, till he had induced his friend to tempt her; unfortunately, the friend suc

ceeded but too well. Or, to vary the symbolism, the diamond which an owner would have tested by some new process, broke during the experiment, and the man was ruined.

This we believe to be quite the best way of dealing with such follies. Such, however, is not the only way in which Mr. Bramley meets his opponent. He shows that dogmatism is the spirit of all the Apostles, and of our LORD Himself. Thus, S. John says, "I have not written unto you, because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth. Who is a liar, but he that denieth that

JESUS is the CHRIST?"

"The Professor trusts entirely to the action of the reason and the conscience when set free from all bias and restraint; and 'conscience,' he tells us, 'cannot be forced,' ' reason and reason alone is our appointed instrument for bringing one another to the truth.' He does not seem to consider that reason is unable to invent truths or to discern them without the consideration and comparison of evidence, a process of which few minds are capable, even if they had the requisite leisure and materials. The conscience also is very much affected by the way in which it has been trained; and there are usually supposed to be a variety of influences, external and internal, which interfere both with the reason and the conscience, and turn them aside from their legitimate objects, truth and right. Suppose the conscience of a young man were set free from all the preconceived notions of duty and of sin, virtue and vice, which he has derived from his parents, his teachers, spiritual pastors and masters,' and that he were set to discover a system of morality from his own observation of the tendency of action, and the verdicts of his own moral sense; is it to be supposed that he would adopt in the end a system as perfect as the Sermon on the Mount or even as the Decalogue, in its most formal and literal acceptation? Yet this is the liberation of the conscience."-Pp. 34, 35.

Mr. Bramley also points out several very gross inaccuracies in Mr. Smith's statements, which in a Professor of History are specially unpardonable.

For whose benefit, in conclusion, we must ask, is this removal of tests to be effected? Roman Catholics Mr. Smith considers as too much addicted to sectarian exclusiveness, to take advantage of it. And very few (so-called) orthodox Dissenters, as Mr. Bramley justly argues, would run the risk of letting their youth hear those doctrines, which they somewhat inconsistently hold, pronounced to be an antiquated superstition. It is simply destruction for destruction's sake, it seems to us, that is desired. Oxford has, during the last fifteen or twenty years, raised up a number of men of pure minds and refined intellects, (for this result they are indebted to the traditions and system of the place,) who under favourable circumstances would no doubt have sought Holy Orders. But the spirit which Arnold and his followers infused into the Church unsettled their minds; they are now in the condition of persons with a vocation manquée; they resent the wrong that has been done them, and then they most unjustly turn against the university, and wish her system altered, instead of understanding that they have only to thank their sceptical friends for unfitting them for any useful position in life. We are certainly not anxious to see their numbers increased.

Mr. NEALE has published a Sermon very characteristic of the author, and very beautiful in itself, which he preached at S. Thomas', Oxford. It is entitled, The Blessing of Isaac. (Oxford: Mowbray.) The same may be said, though on very different grounds, of Mr. KEBLE'S Sermon, preached at Cuddesdon College, which is called Pentecostal Fear. (J. H. Parker.) Mr. Parker has also published two good sermons preached by Mr. MEDD, in Oxford Lenten course.

We are glad to find ourselves at one with Archdeacon GARBETT, in his recent Charge. (Brighton: G. Wakeling.) He speaks out strongly against "the infidelity of the day," and demands to have the constitution of the "Supreme Court of Appeal" altered. To the same purport is Lord LYTTELTON's Letter to the Chairman of a Clerical Meeting. (Rivingtons.) Both are founded chiefly on Mr. Joyce's Ecclesia Vindicata. The layman would have matters of doctrine referred to the Upper House of Convocation; the Archdeacon would have that tribunal strengthened by the addition of certain experts, as Professors and Ecclesiastical Judges. The question is certainly the most pressing of any, and it is very satisfactory to find persons who approach the subject from such different sides, almost agreeing in their conclusions.

Mr. NEALE has collected in a handsome volume, the various Poems of his that have won the Seatonian Prize at Cambridge, (Deighton, Bell, and Co.), and has dedicated them, we are glad to see, "by permission," to the Bishop of Chichester. The first, "on the loosing of the Euphratian Angels," and those on "Egypt" and "Judith" have more liberty of metre, and seem to be more really poetical than any of the others. In the second of these he has some admirable hexameters, of which we give an extract.

"Monarch of ages, the First and the Last, Whose measureless vision
Joining the Past and the Future in one, (where as infinite rivers,
Here, in a moment of time, their two eternities mingle,)

This by Thy Saints hast writ, and that by Thy Prophets foretellest ;
Oh what a moment of time, what a brief-told span of existence
Thou hast appointed for man! Though he mete out the path of the comet,
Measure the depths of the sea, and number the stars of the heaven,
Triumph o'er time, and annihilate space! If his years Thou hast shortened
Since their duration at first, 'twas not harshly, O GOD, nor severely ;—
Who in the passage to Life, (for what is this life but a passage
Out of the storm into calm, to our own dear Country from exile,
Into the region of joy from the kingdom of sorrow,) would linger?
There is the goal of our race, the reward and the end of our contest;
There is the happy array of the souls made perfect through suffering:
There is the realm where tempests are not,—where Paradise blossoms,
Where God's Noon is eternal, and GOD's own Spring everlasting.
Oh how they beckon us on,-those former and earthly companions
Who have put off the corruptible now, and assumed the eternal,—
Oh how they call us away from this earth's poor lures and enticements,
Perishing when at the brightest, no sooner enjoyed than departed!
This is the voice of their love, as they point to the infinite future,
-'Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the First Resurrection !" "

Pp. 151-153.

Mr. MACKENZIE WALCOTT's Interior of a Gothic Minster, (Masters,) is a perfect repertory of ecclesiological and historical information, such as we imagine no other writer of the present day would be competent to furnish. It was read as a lecture at the Architectural Museum, South Kensington.

Macmillan and Co. have published the Sermons preached at Great S. Mary's, Cambridge, during the last Lent. The good produced by them in the University we understand was very great, and we need only say that the Bishop of Oxford, Dr. Pusey, and Messrs. Carter, Woodford, and Liddon were among the preachers, in order to show that the volume affords an unusually good opportunity for forming an estimate of the merits and characteristics of the best style of preaching in the English Church.

The Rev. JULIAN MORETON, Colonial Chaplain at Labuan, has published a cautious and moderate defence of the Missions of the English Church, specially in reference to accusations brought against their economical grounds, in a Letter addressed to the Warden of S. Augustine's College. (Rivingtons.)

Easy Readings from the History of England, (Masters, London,) more than answer their title, and approach very near to giving a complete and consecutive sketch of this country's history. They are intended for young children, but are written on thoroughly good principles, and may be read with advantage by older persons.

We are glad to see that in a second edition the Tract on Infant Baptism, by the Rev. W. W. ENGLISH, M.A., (Rivingtons,) which we formerly noticed favourably, has been revised, and in many respects improved. There is however the same want of accuracy on the subject of the period when spiritual life commences. "He who hath not the SON of God hath not life." To be in CHRIST by foreknowledge of baptism, to which an infant may be brought by preventing grace, does not suffice for actual incorporation into Him in the sacrament of regeneration, otherwise the Church would not teach that till baptism we are "children of wrath," and "hereby made the children of grace."

We have carefully read Dieci Lettere ad un uomo di Stato sopra gli affari della Chiesa in Italia, with the view of ascertaining what would be the result of their circulation in Italy, and the conclusion at which we arrive is, that they can only lead to unbelief. They simply attack the whole system of the Church as seen in that country, and of course have none other to substitute in its place.

The Tracts for the Christian Seasons, (Parker, London,) fulfil very satisfactorily one object proposed, viz., the illustration of the history of the Old Testament. The way in which the facts of the New Testament are dealt with fails to come up to our expectations. Those for Holy Week struck us as especially defective.