German Theological Literature.

419

tions, the history of Jesus Christ, and the history of the Apostolic Church., Dr Kahnis prelects upon the Course or march of churchhistory, and treats in succession of the primitive Catholic Church, (altkatholische Kirche), the medieval Church, and the modern Church. Dr Brückner's theme is the Church of the present, which he exhibits in three phases, the present condition of the Church, the present problems of the Church, and the present prospects of the Church. We turned with special interest to his remarks on the culture of the present age in its relations to Christianity, and we found them conceived in the following superior style:-"There was a time when the Church was the exclusive possessor of culture. At the Reformation also, when she emancipated herself from the hierarchical yoke, she gave the most powerful stimulus to a new epoch in the development of culture. In the present age culture has separated its connection with the Church. It develops itself independently of the Church, or, at least, is thought to do so; and takes up a position either side by side with the Church as her independent equal, or in opposition to her as her rival and enemy. Nay, it has come to this, that many are of opinion that the Church has fallen behind the march of modern culture, and that men see in the Church, not a promoter of cultivation, but a cramp and a hindrance to it. If we look to the leading ideas which dominate the life of the present generation, and with which our age, either consciously or unconsciously, is as it were saturated, we make a surprising discovery. The whole of these ideas came within the view of mankind in and along with Christianity. Christianity was the mother who bore them, at least in their pure and perfect_form. But in the progress of time they have left their Christian home, they have gone their own ways, have lent themselves to the service of other powers, and have thus, in many ways, become corrupt and degenerate. It is the parable of the prodigal son which has been repeated with a part of the original stock of Christian thought. The self-willed departure of these ideas from the father's house was their ruin. A return to the home which they have left will be their only deliverance." "There is no idea which dominates our age in an equal degree with that of humanity. A great, a noble idea! It means the conception of the nobility of human nature, and a conduct on the part of men corresponding to this nobility. It is the thought of pure, perfect manhood which finds in that idea expression. Now it was Christianity which first introduced this thought into human life. The pre-Christian ages strove to attain to it, but failed to reach it both in its full content and in its whole compass in its full content, for they failed to reach the idea of man as a being exalted above the powers of nature; and in its whole compass, for the wife, the child, the slave, still denied their social rights, were also therein deprived of their full human rights. Add the distinction then made between Greeks and barbariansWhat a line of demarcation! What a split torn through the heart of humanity! Christianity, on the other hand, was the first to make man a full, complete man, The idea of the image of God in man implies a nobility of mankind, without distinction of race, such as is nowhere else to be found. In the single fact of the God-man

lies the presupposition that the human is capable of alliance and union with the divine, with a clearness which exists nowhere else. With the thought of the kingdom of God all bounds and limits separating man from man fall away in a manner nowhere else to be seen. While in regeneration man's better self is delivered from his lower and worse self, in a manner and degree elsewhere without all example. In Christianity, therefore, nothing really human is suppressed, but everything, on the contrary, is glorified. Christianity is the religion of humanity," &c., &c.

This is a fair specimen of the elevated thought and style of these Lectures. They contain much that might be made available for the more thoughtful kind of preaching among ourselves, and very much that would be helpful to those who lay themselves out for usefulness as public lecturers upon subjects of Christianity and the Church.

XII.-CRITICAL NOTICES.

Pre-Historic Times, as illustrated by Ancient Remains, and the Manners and Customs of Modern Savages. By JOHN LUBBOCK, F.R.S. Williams and Norgate. 1865.

The author of this interesting and valuable work gives in the preface the following statement of the object he had in view in preparing it, and of the means he adopted to inform himself fully and accurately on the subjects of which it treats:-" My object has been to elucidate as far as possible the principles of Pre-Historic Archæology, laying special stress upon the indications which it affords of the condition of man in primeval times. The tumuli or burial mounds, the peat-bogs of this and other countries, the Kjökkenmöddings or shell-mounds of Denmark, the Lake habitations of Switzerland, the bone-caves, and the river-drift gravels, are here our principal sources of information. In order to qualify myself for the task which I have undertaken, I have visited not only our three great museums in London, Dublin, and Edinburgh, but also many on the continent; as, for instance, those at Copenhagen, Stockholm, Lund, Flensburg, Aarhuus, Lausanne, Basle, Berne, Zurich, Yverdon, Paris, Abbeville, &c. besides many private collections of great interest, of which I may particularly specify those of M. Boucher de Perthes, Messrs Christy, Evans, Bateman, Forel, Schwab, Troyon, Gilliéron, Uhlmann, Desor, and, lastly, the one recently made by M.M. Christy and Lartet, in the bone-caves of the Dordogne. Sometimes alone, and sometimes in company with Messrs Prestwich and Evans, I have made numerous visits to the valley of the Somme, and have examined almost every gravel-pit and section, from Amiens down to the sea. In 1861, with Mr Busk, and again in 1863, I went to Denmark, in order to have the advantage of seeing the Kjökkenmöddings themselves. Under the guidance of Professor Steenstrup, I visited several of the most celebrated shell mounds, particularly those at Havelse, Bilidt, Meilgaard, and Fannerup. I likewise made myself

Lubbock on the Antiquity of Man.

421

familiar with so much of the Danish language as was necessary to enable me to read the various reports drawn up by the Kjökkenmödding Committee, consisting of Professors Steenstrup, Worsaae, and Forchhammer. Last year I went to the North of Scotland to examine some similar shell-mounds, discovered by Dr Gordon of Birnie, on the shores of the Moray Firth, which appear, however, to belong to a much later period than those of Denmark. In 1862, M. Morlot very kindly devoted himself to me for nearly a month, during which time we not only visited the principal museums of Switzerland, but also several of the Lake-habitations themselves, and particularly those at Morges, Thonon, Wauwyl, Moosseedorf, and the Pont de Thiele. In addition to many minor excursions, I had, finally, last spring, the advantage of spending some time with Mr Christy among the celebrated bone-caves of the Dordogne. Thus, by carefully examining the objects themselves, and the localities in which they have been found, I have endeavoured to obtain a more vivid and correct impression of the facts than books, or even museums, alone could have given."

A work prepared at such a great expense of time, money, and labour, could not fail to be a very valuable repository of antiquarian facts, a kind of archæological museum in print. As such it may be strongly recommended to all who have a desire to inform themselves upon the numerous topics of pre-historic antiquity, which have lately called forth so much curiosity and interest in the public mind. Mr Lubbock arranges and communicates his facts in a very clear and satisfactory way, and his text is profusely illustrated with woodcuts of the numerous antiquarian objects referred to. After three introductory chapters on "the use of bronze in ancient times," on "the bronze age," and on "the use of stone in ancient times," he discusses, in seven successive chapters, the Tumuli, the Lake-habitations of Switzerland, the Danish shell-mounds or kitchen-middens, North American archæology, Cavemen, the flint weapons and organic remains of the river-drift gravels of the valley of the Somme, and the estimates of the antiquity of man founded upon excavations and measurements made in the mud of the Nile, the delta of the Mississippi, the cone of the Tènière, &c. &c. We offer no opinion of the scientific quality and character of these discussions, which can only be judged of by men of science, who have made a special study of these recondite and difficult subjects; and, till the geologists themselves are better agreed in the interpretations which they put upon phenomena and facts, we think it more reasonable to hold our own judgment in suspense, in regard to the conclusions which have been reached on both sides. The questions raised in connection with the remains found in river-drift gravels and in ancient bone-caves are evidently questions, not of pure archaeology, but dependent for their solution chiefly on geological considerations. Geology, however, has still two opposing schools, the Tranquillists and the Paroxysmists, distinguished teachers of both these schools, both in England and France, have differed, and continue to differ, in the chronological conclusions which they derive from the same acknowledged facts. Mr Lubbock is a Tranquillist, like his chief Sir Charles Lyell, and, like him, would assign an immense antiquity to our race, of which he thinks the monuments are to be found, not in Egypt, or the distant hoary East, but at our own doors, on the opposite shores of England and France. For our own part, we think all such conclusions hasty and premature, and as such, contrary to the cautious inductive habit of true science; and the author, we think, might fairly have been expected to set an example of more caution and circumspection, considering the spirit in which he writes of the bearing of such investigations upon religious truth. In the Preface he declares himself fully satisfied that religion and science cannot in reality be at variance ;" and "I have striven," he adds, "in the present publication to

and

follow out the rule laid down by the Bishop of London in his excellent lecture delivered last year at Edinburgh. Ethnology, in fact, is passing at present through a phase from which other sciences have safely emerged; and the new views with reference to the antiquity of man, though still looked upon with distrust and apprehension, will, I doubt not, in a few years be regarded with as little disquietude as are now those discoveries in astronomy and geology, which at one time excited even greater opposition." The tone of these remarks is respectful and friendly to the claims of revealed truth; but the assumption running through them, that the great question of the antiquity of man, viewed as a question of pure science, is already settled, is certainly premature. The settlement is still in the future, even in the judgment of men of science themselves; and, meanwhile, we may remind our readers of the following pertinent observations of Archdeacon Pratt, in his " Scripture and Science not at Variance" (1861):-" Mr Babbage has given an ingenious hypothetic solution of the problem, how the remains of man may have been commingled with the disinterred remains of more recent formation (see Royal Society Proceed ings, 1850). And if human ingenuity can devise a way by which the phenomena may have been brought about, how many other possible ways may there be of which we know nothing. Professor Henslow, no mean authority as a geological observer of many years' standing, has recently visited the gravel beds in France, as well as Suffolk, where remains of art have been discovered, and his opinion is this:-The facts I have witnessed do not of necessity support the hypothesis of a prehistoric antiquity for these works of man. Neither do I consider the bones of extinct animals found associated with them must of necessity be supposed to have belonged to individuals contemporary with the uncunning workmen who wrought the rude hatchets with the means at their disposal. He then goes on to give his reasons, basing them upon the disturbed appearance of the beds, as implying cataclysmic action, which must have brought the hatchets and fossils together. And further, in a carefully written article in Blackwood (October 1860), by one who has examined the gravel beds, the result is most conclusive that a remote prehistoric antiquity for the human race is by no means proved by the flint remains' The article closes as follows:In conclusion then of the whole inquiry, condensing into one expression my answer to the general question, Whether a remote prehistoric antiquity for the human race has been established from the recent discovery of specimens of man's handiwork in the so-called Diluvium, I maintain it is not proven; by no means insisting that it can be disproved, but insisting simply that it remains-Not Proven."

.

Correspondance des Reformateurs dans les pays de langue française. Reuceillie et publiée. Par A. L. HERMINJARD. Tome I. (1512-1516.) Genève H. Georg, libraire, 1866. [Correspondence of the Reformers in French-speaking Countries. Collected and published by A. L. Herminjard. Tome I. (1512-1526.) Geneva: II. Georg. 1866.]

There are some publications which the press can recommend to the public without the least reserve, and such works are too rare not to be specially and promptly distinguished. That M. Herminjard's is of this number, the title itself is a sufficient guarantee. Every Christian who blesses God for the work accomplished by the reformers three centuries ago, must be aware how much he owes to the eminent works produced in our day by French protestants, or by German scholars, who have illustrated the origin of the Reformation, and the heroism of those times of new life and spiritual vigour.

Correspondence of the Reformers.

423

Merle d'Aubigné led the way; the Weisses, the Haags, the Bonnets, the Coquerels, and the de Felices in France; the Henrys and the de Polenzes in Germany have followed; and, while carefully consulting the ancient records, have prosecuted this work with patience and success. Soon the Reformation will be thoroughly known, even in its minutest details, and will be no longer exposed to the calumny of popish writers as in days past.

The work of Mr Herminjard must take a distinguished place in the researches hitherto made, as he has bestowed upon it the most elaborate care, and has been occupied for the last twenty years in its preparation. Being a minister in the Canton of Vaud he had undertaken to write the life of the reformer Viret. His researches, conducted with a conscientious exactitude, soon led him to perceive errors in the traditional narratives of the Reformation. In order to clear up these matters, he had recourse to the correspondence of the reformers, in which he found many unpublished pieces, and made researches which were crowned with success. By and by, instead of writing a life of Viret, he began to arrange a considerable quantity of letters, of which a large number had never seen the light. Such is the collection the publication of which has just commenced, and of which there will be in all ten volumes. The publisher, Georg, Geneva, intends to issue one volume every year.

We have now before us volume first. It begins by the dedication addressed to G. Briçonnet, which Lefèvrs d'Etaples printed at the head of his commentary on the Epistle of Paul in 1512, and concludes by an anonymous and unpublished letter, written towards the end of 1526, and addressed to Martin Eucer. The work has evidently been prepared with the most minute care, and displays marks of learning and ability on the part of the author. Supported by some of the most competent men of Geneva, and of the Canton of Vaud, M. Herminjard has not confined himself to the reproduction of the letters of the reformers, but often adds the answers of their correspondents (among which are found many written by Erasmus). In fact, he has given all the letters which can throw any light upon the state of things. In addition to this, he has accompanied the text with notes, occasionally extended; at the head of every letter he gives a brief summary of its contents, and describes the personages therein mentioned, he explains the obscure allusions to the circumstances of the times, discusses the dates, and attempts to discover to whom the anonymous letters may be ascribed; in a word, he does all that is possible in order to make this collection an epistolary history of the Reformation in the French-speaking countries. We have said enough to indicate the merit of the undertaking. Too often the religious public, who receive productions of a transient worth with enthusiasm, look with indifference on those great works which are destined to have a permanent value. It is an honour to that part of Switzerland in which the French language is spoken, and especially to Geneva, that a publication of such importance has found there the needful support. We hope that it will be eagerly received in Great Britain and Ireland, and that those readers who know how to estimate works of a superior order, will look with interest to the appearance of these volumes, which are addressed, not to Christians of any particular denomination, but to all who hold the principles of the Reformation; and not to Christians only, but to all the lovers of true history. We heartily wish the work all success, and may shortly devote to it an article more extended than this simple notice.