There are few finer instances of loyal and intelligent discipleship in literature than that of James Marsh. The honor which such an attachment brings is not less to the pupil than to the master. Yet independently of Coleridge, Dr. Marsh would have done good service to the cause of philosophy, for his convictions were his own. It is fruitless to speculate what direction his work would have taken if he had not had Coleridge as his philosopher and guide, but we may be quite sure that in some way he would have uttered his protest against the regnant philosophy and theology of his time and country. With his earnest belief in the freedom of the Will he could not but have controverted the prevailing Edwardean theory. With his antipathy to the sensation school of philosophy he must needs have told others of the sweet reasonableness of Idealism. With his conception of the conformity of reason and revelation he could not have remained silent concerning their underlying unity. As it was, he spoke through another, but he spoke himself.

We have purposely confined ourselves to the philosophical work of President Marsh, but his influence on theology was also not inconsiderable. The nature and origin of Sin were interpreted to him by his theory of the Will, and he drew attention away from the fall of Adam to fasten it upon the sinful individual. With respect to the Atonement he was regarded by many as heterodox, but, following Coleridge, he wisely insisted upon its manward influence, leaving the mystery of its Godward effect for more presuming and confident minds to fathom. The narrow theology held by many of his contemporaries found in him an expansion conformable to his broad philosophical principles, and he broadened others by his breadth.

Neither his philosophy nor his theology, it is true, is flaw

less. It is not even what it would have been had he lived in our day. Viewed, however, in the light of his time and his advantages, this isolated, hard-pressed, earnest student merits high honor and lasting esteem as a worthy pioneer in American philosophy.

Said President Porter of him: "His modest demeanor, his amiable disposition, his freedom from craft and cunning, his obvious and ardent love of truth wherever it was to be found, the thoroughness of his scholarship, his iron diligence, his warm susceptibility to the good and the noble, and his disposition to master every subject in its principles-were such as to merit for him a reputation and an earthly reward far higher than he received." This is high praise, but it is confirmed by those who knew him as a man. As a philosopher his work proves him to be one of those who, in his own words, "escaping from the thraldom of the sensuous and the present, with large discourse of reason looking before and after, form their minds to the discovery and apprehensions of ultimate principles."

ARTICLE VII.

AUGUSTINE AS AN EXEGETE.

BY THE REVEREND J. RITCHIE SMITH.

THE place of Augustine is with the foremost creative minds of history. No other man has exercised such imperial sway in any realm of thought as the great Latin father in the realm of theology. Even Aristotle must yield to him the palm. As he strove to grasp and reduce to order the whole range of Christian truth, his theology is broad enough to embrace the difficulties, the apparent contradictions, which the Word of God presents, while it partakes of the errors and imperfections which belong to all things human. To his authority, therefore, appeal the most diverse schools of theology and philosophy,— Roman Catholic and Protestant, scholastic and mystic, Thomas Aquinas and Anselm and Pascal and Luther and Calvin ; while Christians of every name do him honor as the most potent champion of the faith which they hold in common. He is the greatest man of the Christian church since the days of the apostles, the successor of Paul in logical acumen, of John in spiritual fervor. It is a profoundly interesting study to trace the principles and methods by which he wrought out of the Scripture the massive system that bears his name.

HIS EQUIPMENT.

Of his education he has given us a sketch in his "Confessions." He was trained for oratory, and studied grammar, rhetoric, and books of eloquence. In the school of rhetoric in Carthage he won the first place; became a teacher of the art,

and practiced his profession in Rome and Milan. All the books of the so-called liberal arts-rhetoric, logic, geometry, music, arithmetic-that came within his reach, he read and understood. Of astronomy he had some knowledge. With pagan literature he was familiar from childhood. When scarcely twenty years of age he read and comprehended without a teacher the Ten Predicaments of Aristotle. He read both Greek and Latin biographies (Jerome, Letter LXXV. 3). Certain books of the Platonists he read in a Latin translation. His knowledge of Greek and Roman history appears in his "City of God," and his acquaintance with Greek philosophy is often shown (Letter CXVIII.; City of God, viii.). Plato he preferred to all other philosophers, because he came nearest to Christian truth. At one time, pleading the authority of Ambrose (Christ. Doct. ii. 28. 43), he held the opinion that Plato was a disciple of Jeremiah. Afterward he acknowledged his mistake, yet admits that Plato may have been acquainted with the prophecy of Jeremiah (Retract. ii. 4; City of God, viii. 11).1

In early life Augustine composed poems in various kinds of meter, and wrote two or three books on "The Fair and the Fit." He wrote six books on rhythm, and purposed to write as many more on music, but was prevented (Letter CI. 3). In the summer of his conversion he suffered from weakness of the lungs induced by excessive study. Quotations from Greek and Latin literature are frequent. His favorite authors were Virgil, Cicero, whose "Hortensius" inflamed him with the love of wisdom, Varro, Sallust, and Plato. He cites, moreover, Horace, Lucan, Terence, Persius, Ovid, Livy, Juvenal,

1 For convenience the translation of the fathers published by the Christian Literature Company of New York is used, with occasional reference to writings which it does not include.

Ennius, Homer, Plutarch, Apuleius, Justinus, Scaevola, Seneca, Claudian, Terentian, Euhemerus, Labeo, Aulus Gellius, Plotinus, Pliny, Lucretius.

The weak point in his exegetical equipment was his imperfect acquaintance with the original tongues of Scripture, though his deficiencies have often been exaggerated. Gibbon remarks, "According to the judgment of the most impartial critics, the superficial learning of Augustine was confined to the Latin language." The great historian usually followed safer guides. Augustine had some knowledge of the Punic, a language spoken within recent times (Letter XVII.), which he pronounced akin to the Hebrew and the Syriac (N. T. Homil. lxiii. 2; Tract. on John, xv. 27). Several times he interprets Punic words-Namphanio (Letter XVII.), Mammon, which is both Punic and Hebrew (N. T. Hom. Ixiii. 2; Serm. on Mt. ii. 14. 47), iar (Ps cxxiv. 5). He observes that Edom in Punic signifies "blood" (Ps. cxxxvi. 7), and Bal is equivalent to "lord" (Qu. on Judg. xvi.; see also Serm. clxvii. 3; Rom. xiii.; De Magistro xliv.).

Of Hebrew, which he believed to be the original language of the race (City of God, xvi. 11), he confessed himself wholly ignorant (Conf. xi. 3; Letter CI. 3); as were the fathers generally, except Origen and Jerome. His dependence upon others led him into curious errors. He preferred to derive "Hebrews" from Heber, but thought that the derivation from Abraham-" Abrahews "-might possibly be correct (City of God, xvi. 3). Racha and Hosanna he supposed to be interjections, incapable of translation (Christ. Doct. ii. 11; John li. 2); David signifies "strong in hand" or "desirable (Ps. xxxv. 1; cxxxii. 2);1 Galilee, “transmigration” or “revela

1

1 Origen says it means skillful with the hand" (Matt ii.).