Having elsewhere alluded to the interpolation of the word "one" in the Nicene Creed of our Prayer-book, it may be well to take this opportunity of freeing myself from the charge of inconsiderate presumption. The defence which I have set up is founded on 1 Cor. viii. 6— "To us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in Him:" where the intention of St. Paul evidently is to distinguish between the gods many of the heathen world, and the One God-the Essential Deity-of whom, and through whom, and to whom are all things. (Rom. xi. 36.) But, since we cannot connect personality with the Essential Deity, we are at liberty to address our prayers either to the Father, who is revealed to us as the first person in the Godhead, or to the Son, the second person, or to the Holy Ghost, the third person; each of these glorious persons having the same essential dignity and equality, and constituting conjointly One God, in which term not uni-personality but essential unity is implied. We have therefore God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. But not One God the Father, One God the Son, or One God the Holy Ghost. Leslie has put it clearly thus: "The Father, of whom are all things, means God in his nature, which includes the whole Trinity, who are jointly the Father of all creatures." Thus the ambiguity is entirely raised by detaching the words "One God the Father," in the text, from the context, and using it dogmatically in the Creed, and distinct from the context. In the Apostles' Creed the objection is not incurred.

I hope I shall be pardoned for making this not insignificant digression. But nothing connected with our holy

religion is foreign from Henry Martyn, who, in the midst of Hindoos and Mahometans, found safety only, to use his own words, in holding by God, as a child clings to the neck of his mother. "What a contrast," he exclaims in his journal, “is the holiness of the Word of God to the mock majesty of the Koran, and the trifling indecent stuff of the Ramayuna." The following is the last allusion I shall make to his intercourse with Jews in the East.

"and

“ The Mussulmen Jews came up to me," he says, asked what would become of them in another world? The Mahometans were right in their way, they supposed, and we in ours; but what must they expect? After rectifying their mistakes as to the Mahometans, I mentioned two or three reasons for believing that we were right; such as their dispersion, and the cessation of sacrifices immediately on the appearance of Jesus. 'True, true!' they said, with great feeling and seriousness; indeed, they seemed disposed to yield assent to any thing I said. They confessed they had become Mahometans only on compulsion; and that Abdoolghunee wished to go to Bagdad, thinking he might throw off the mask there with safety, but asked what I thought? I said, ‘the Governor was a Mahometan.' 'Did I think Syria safer?' 'The safest place in the East,' I said, 'was India.' Feelings of pity for God's ancient people, and the awful importance of eternal things, impressed on my mind by the seriousness of their inquiries as to what would become of them, relieved me from the pressure of my comparatively insignificant distresses. I, a poor Gentile, blest, honoured, and loved, secured for ever by the ever

lasting covenant; whilst the children of the kingdom are lying still in total darkness! Well does it become me to

be thankful."

So universal a spirit of inquiry had been excited in the city of Shiraz, by Mr. Martyn's frequent disputations, as well as by the notoriety of his being engaged in a translation of the New Testament into Persian, that the Preceptor of all the Moolahs, Mirza Ibraheem, began greatly to "fear whereunto this would grow." An Arabic defence therefore of Mahometanism made its appearance from his pen. A considerable time had been spent in its preparation, and on its seeing the light, it obtained the credit of surpassing all former treatises upon Islam. As far as a judgment of it can be formed from a translation discovered amongst Mr. Martyn's papers, it is written with much temper and moderation, and with as much candour as is consistent with that degree of subtlety which is indispensable in an apology for so glaring an imposture as Mahometanism."

After declaring his desire to avoid altercation and wrangling, and expressing his hopes that God would guide into the right way those whom He chose, the chief Moolah endeavours to show, as his main point, the superiority of the single perpetual miracle of the Koran, addressed to the understanding, above the variety of miracles wrought by Moses and Christ, which were originally addressed only to the senses, and which, from lapse of time, become every day less and less powerful in their influence. The Defence concludes with the following appeal to Mr. Martyn :-" Thus behold, then, O thou that art wise, and consider with the eye of justice, since

thou hast no excuse to offer to God. Thou hast wished to see the truth of miracles: we desire you to look at the great Koran; that is an everlasting miracle.”

This work Mr. Martyn immediately set himself to refute. His answer was divided into two parts; the first was devoted principally to an attack upon Mahometanism; the second was intended to display the evidences and establish the authority of the Christian faith. It was written in Persian, and from a translation of the first part, which has been found, it is evident that, whilst Mr. Martyn used great plainness of speech, he treated his opponent with meekness and courtesy. After replying to various arguments of Mirza Ibraheem, he shows, as sufficient ground for the rejection of Mahometanism,— that Mahomet was foretold by no Prophet-that he worked no miracle-that he spread his religion by means merely human, and framed his precepts and promises to gratify men's sensuality, both here and hereafter— that he was most ambitious both for himself and his family—that his Koran is full of gross absurdities and palpable contradictions-that it contains a method of salvation wholly inefficacious, which Mr. M. contrasted with the glorious and efficacious way of salvation held out in the Gospel, through the divine atonement of Jesus Christ. In conclusion, he says to Mirza Ibraheem, "I beg you to view these things with the eye of impartiality. If the evidence be indeed convincing, mind not the contempt of the ignorant, nor even death itself; for the vain world is passing away, like the wind of the desert."

"If you do not see the evidence to be sufficient, my

prayer is, that God may guide you; so that you, who have been a guide to men in the way you thought right, may now both see the truth, and call men to God, through Jesus Christ, who hath loved us, and washed us from our sins in His blood.' His glory and dominion be everlasting."*

What I have already said about Mr. Martyn might suffice as a feeble tribute of my own gratitude and esteem; but to do full justice to this great and good man is a task beyond my power. Even "His Memoir," to which I am indebted for a great part of what has been said by me respecting him as a missionary, exhibits him somewhat too much as an enthusiast; for it is certain that his religious zeal, deep as was its root in the heart, was regulated by the exercise of extraordinary mental powers, and constant meditation on "the Word of God." The Bible was his all in all; and thus was he kept as far from Puritanism as from Formalism. I believe I may already have mentioned that, calling on him one day at his rooms in St. John's College, to get some proposition in the eleventh book of "Newton's Principia" explained to me, I found him with a Bible before him, which he forthwith laid aside, and, after dropping a few words which led me to perceive that the contents of the Bible were as familiar to him as they were satisfactory, he took a sheet of paper and at once wrote down all the information I required. Mathematics might have ceased to engross his mind, but they were decidedly at his

* For further notices of the Koran, see ch. iii. of "Scripture Notices and Proofs," by C. Carlyon, M.D.