power was one of the first privileges allowed them, or rather, they permitted the bishops to exercise, according to the established law, a power which, in some degree or other, they exercised in their own dioceses spiritually.

It is much more probable that the idea of the hereditary family lawyer, which every British peer of Parliament is, by his descent, and the annexing of the supreme judicial power to the eldest son, was derived from the episcopal order, and the contemplation of those institutions of the Deity that are so closely allied to episcopacy. The principles that adopted episcopacy in the State contributed to form an hereditary tribunal of justice, rather than that the baronial power introduced the episcopal into the exercise of judgment. The superior Levite was always a judge, and so was the priest also; and the apostles who took their places on their extinction at Jerusalem, also took their power. We have directed our chief attention to these usurpations of the bill, from the wish of preserving the Church of England in its true apostolic character, and to rescue it from the imputation cast against it by its enemies, that it is merely a Parliamentary Church--a charge which this transmutation of the bishops into the Queen's courts, and the almost boundless license as to the oath, would very much contribute to justify. We freely confess the existence of many abuses; we have no wish to perpetuate them. We neither wish to institute jobs, to retain peculiars, maintain imperfect courts, or impede the free, ready, and cheap administration of justice; but we desire to see the diocesan courts maintained in their apostolic dignity, and their original independence, because they are one of the earliest sources of constitutional law, and the spiritual and temporal order now existing in the State; and nothing would be more casy than to have local courts ramify from them through each diocese, as the justices of the peace communicate with the quarter sessions or the assizes; and the judges of Doctors' Commons might move down to them as the rest of the judges from the metropolis.

With regard to the abolition of the canon or civil law, and its forms and principles, and the substitution of the common in its stead, the opinion of Judge Blackstone is most decisive; he conceives such a change in our law as equally impolitic and impossible.

Η ΚΑΙΝΗ ΔΙΑΘΗΚΗ.

Reviews.

S.

The Greek Testament, with Brief English Notes, chiefly philological and explanatory, especially formed for the use of Colleges and Schools; but also adapted to serve as a convenient manual for general purposes. Third Edition, greatly enlarged and very considerably improved. By the Rev. S. T. Bloomfield, D.D., F.S.A. London: Longman. 1843. Pp. vii. 592. 8vo. THE leading purpose of Dr. Bloomfield, in undertaking the present work, was to supply what had long been an acknowledged desideratum in biblical literature, viz., an edition of the Greek Testament with English notes, adapted to the purpose of scholastic

instruction, and yet such as might be useful to less informed academical students. Two editions having been exhausted, Dr. Bloomfield has now offered to the public a third, enlarged, and so considerably improved, as to furnish the class of students for whom it is especially designed with a comprehensive and cheap critical edition of the New Testament, abundantly sufficient to carry them through their studies. Besides carefully re-moulding the whole of the annotatory matter contained in the previous editions, by enlarging the pages (without any increase of price), he has introduced much important additional information. The text is the same as that introduced in his larger edition of the Greek Testament; and very particular attention has been given to the punctuation, which is so regulated as materially to assist the less advanced student; and thus, by determining the sense where it appears to be uncertain, occasionally to supply the place of explanation by note, and in all cases materially to diminish the labour and to facilitate the progress of the student. The notes also are very considerably enlarged, both in number and extent, and leave no really difficult passage unexplained. Another, and certainly not the least important improvement in this third edition, is, the addition of an index of the words and phrases explained in the notes; which will greatly aid the student in ascertaining the meaning of a particular word or phrase, which he may not find in any given passage; since the conciseness necessary in a work of this nature, is such as to forbid the explanation of a word or phrase on more than one occasion. There is prefixed a neat map of Palestine, in the time of Christ.

The best recommendation of this work is the fact, that two large editions have been sold in the short space of little more than six years; and that it has been recommended by the learned Bishop of Durham, as a text-book for the University of Durham. Indeed, it requires only to be known, in order to introduce it into every college, lecture-room, and superior grammar-school. In its present greatly improved state, Dr. Bloomfield's edition of the Greek Testament is the most comprehensive manual edition, with critical apparatus, with which we are acquainted; and those who cannot afford to purchase larger and more expensive works, will find it an invaluable aid to the study of that sacred volume.

8vo.

Cyclopaedia of Biblical Literature. By John Kitto, Editor of the Pictorial Bible, &c., assisted by various able Scholars and Divines. London: Longman and Co. 1843. Parts I. to. IV. This is a very useful and important, and will no doubt become a very popular and standard work in our theological libraries. The Bible is such an inexhaustible source of truth and knowledge, that no Christian mind can ever feel the least astonishment at the tens of thousands of volumes to which it has given rise. Like the book of nature, which has been represented in all ages by artists in millions of pictures or tableaux, and which still remains comparatively unexplored, so the Book of Revelation contains such mines of knowledge

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and wisdom, that it would take ages of research fully to develope its vast and glorious contents.

Mr. Kitto's work is at once an agreeable companion to the wellinstructed, a valuable book of reference to the student, and a most admirable instructor to those who have not hitherto sufficiently investigated with curious but religiously disposed minds, the sacred volume. The activity of biblical research in this country, in Germany, and in the United States of America, has of late years accumulated in this department of literature a large body of valuable matter, with the results of which it has become of the utmost importance that the English reader should be made acquainted in such a form as the present, viz., fully in detail, but yet in periodical numbers or parts. The work is very properly divided into biblical criticism, biblical interpretation, history, geography, archæology, and physical science.

The work is, of course, chiefly occupied by matters which find no place, or no sufficient place in other works, while many subjects of much general importance, and which rightly claim ample room elsewhere, are here noticed only in those relations which connect them with biblical history, antiquities, or literature.

The alphabetical series of words are arranged in this Cyclopædia on a new plan. It has hitherto been usual to form the vocabulary of a Biblical Cyclopædia out of the current version of the Scriptures. In the present case, a number of new words are introduced, not necessarily contained in the public version, but pertaining to the things of the Bible, or to biblical literature. The principle which retains such words as Behemoth, Urim, Leviathan, &c., in the authorized version, is, in this Cyclopædia, extended to all Hebrew words coming within its plan, the meaning of which is in any degree doubtful or disputed. In such cases the original word takes its place in the alphabetical series; and the necessary explanations and descriptions are then given, rather under the real word than under the disputed interpretation. Long treatises or dissertations are very properly avoided, and general statements are given under the leading word (such as Bible, Chronology, &c.) and the details are referred to separate articles.

The work is illustrated by maps and engravings on steel, as well as by wood engravings, representing landscapes, buildings, monuments, plants, animals, illustrations of manners and customs, and whatever can be more clearly displayed by pictorial than by written descriptions, or by which the written text can be in any degree elucidated.

The prospectus of this Cyclopædia promised much, but it is only an act of justice to say, that the four first parts have abundantly realized all the promises which were so made.

The History of the Church of Scotland from the Reformation to the present time. By T. Stephen, Med. Librarian, King's College, London. London: John Lendrum. Parts 1 and 2. 8vo. THE history of the Church of Scotland and its Reformation has not now to be told for the first time, but Mr. Stephen undertakes to

introduce facts and circumstances which have not hitherto been sufficiently detailed. Not, indeed, that new facts of any great importance have now to be related as novelties, and not that new discoveries have been made in the history of Scotch Presbyterianism, but then the earlier historians of the Reformation in Scotland compressed the accounts of the transactions in the time of Knox and Melville, into an introductory chapter or preface, and hence gave but an abbreviated view of the struggles between the ecclesiastical and the civil powers which agitated the kingdom of Scotland in the sixteenth century. The history of that period has, therefore, not hitherto been so fully and truly developed as its importance deserves, but Mr. Stephen proposes to supply this deficiency.

The work, of which a specimen is before us, is to consist of from twenty-one to twenty-four parts, each containing one hundred and twelve pages, and which will together form three large and valuable volumes. These volumes will be embellished with portraits of the leading characters connected with the history: and certainly those of Cardinal Beaton, Archbishop of St. Andrew's, and of John Knox, given in these first two parts, are admirably executed.

The first volume is to contain the commencement of the Reformation, with the sufferings of the first martyrs and confessors, and will conclude with an account of the abolition of patronage. The second volume will begin with the history of the Protestors or Presbyterians, and will conclude with the close of the seventeenth century. The third volume will commence with the establishment of the Presbyterians, and an account of their strength and numbers at the Revolution, and to close with the Veto Act, the Non-intrusion question, and the present state of the establishment.

The first part opens with an account of the cruelties practised by the Pope's representative, Beaton, towards those who at the close of the fifteenth century began to know, and to confess the truth. The Popish Bishop of Dunkeld at that time challenged the Vicar of Dollar for preaching every Sunday to his parishioners on the Epistle and Gospels for the day. The Bishop admonished him to discontinue this custom, adding, that "if the Vicar could find a good Epistle or a good Gospel, that setteth forth the liberty of the holy Church, he might instruct his people in that, but to let the rest alone; for I thank God (continued the Bishop) that I have lived well these many years, and never knew either the Old or the New Testament. I am contented with my Missal and my Breviary, and if you, Dean Thomas, leave not these fantasies, you will have cause to repent." The good vicar pulled a copy of the New Testament from his pocket at the stake, which was rudely snatched from him by Lauder the Official, or Archdeacon of Lothian, who impiously called it "a book of Heresy!" "God forgive you, brother (said Forrest); you ought not to call the book of the Evangel of Jesus Christ the book of heresy." But true to the letter and the spirit of the Church of Rome, Lauder retorted, "Knowest thou not that it is contrary to our canons and express commands to have a New Testament or Bible in English, and that this of itself is enough to condemn thee?"

At the same period Russell, a priest of the order of the Grey

Friars, and Kennedy, a youth under eighteen years of age, were likewise accused of heresy. They were bound to one stake, and while the fire was preparing, the former comforted his youthful fellowsufferer, who showed some symptoms of natural fear in the hour of trial. "Fear not, brother (said he), for He is more mighty that is in us, than he that is in the world. The pain which we shall suffer is short and light; but our joy and consolation shall never have an end. Death cannot destroy us, for it is already destroyed by Him for whose sake we suffer. Therefore let us strive to enter in by the same strait way which our Saviour hath taken before us." Having commended their souls to God, the fire was kindled, and they were added to the noble army of martyrs.

We think well of these first two parts of this "History of the Church of Scotland," and shall examine with interest the future portions of this work.

An Essay on the Relation in which the Moral Precepts of the Old and New Testament stand to each other. To which was adjudged the Hulsean Prize for 1842. By John Davies, B.A., Scholar of St. John's College, Cambridge; and Curate of St. Giles in the Fields, London. Cambridge: Deightons and Stevenson. One vol. 8vo. IT has pleased God that man should be like the Deity in the possession of this high privilege-that his actions should not spring from necessity of nature, but from an intelligent and consenting will. He is thus endowed with a gift, great, but yet fearful in its nature; elevating him far above the rest of the creatures of God, that inhabit with him this lower world, but connecting him with deep and solemn responsibilities. A stone, when thrown into the air, necessarily falls to the ground from the operation of unvarying laws to which it is subject. It has no power of resistance or of motion by any conscious act, and therefore can have no moral agency. But man, possessing a higher nature, spiritual in its kind, and capable of perception and thought; having the power of bending his mind by a conscious and independent act to the object of his choice, is fitted for motives and actions which, having relation to a standard of right and wrong, are called moral. When different modes of action are presented to his mind, he is able, by the exercise of reason, to examine them; and then, by a movement of the will, to prefer and adopt whichever he may choose. Knowledge, therefore, and will, are the sources of action in man; and when his mind was in the state of order or spiritual harmony in which his gracious Creator framed it, his reason was perfect in the perception of good, and his will was the ready handmaid of reason in preferring and embracing it.

It is in this way that Mr. Davies brings forward the propositions which he discusses in this prize essay, and shows the origin and nature of law-the distinction between positive and moral preceptsthe nature of the Jewish and Christian dispensations as revelations of divine truth-the substantial identity of the two dispensations as systems of moral precepts-the greater fulness and extent of Christian morality-the principles and motives of morality under the