We therefore are much pleased with Mr. Froude's suggestion that the statutes at large should be the text book of English History in Oxford. They present us with no view of history, but with a real outline, it may be in places incomplete, but true beyond dispute as far as it goes. Mr. Froude says (p. 69) that facts which show the incompatibility of our received notions of the men of old with evident traces of their real character exhibited in their daily conduct,

"compel us to feel that large chasms exist somewhere in our conceptions of our past history, and we propose that with the new history classes at Oxford, the experiment be made, with some period or periods, of studying it in the text of the contemporary statutes. The statutes antecedent to the invention of printing are brief and are, moreover, exceedingly imperfect. While therefore they are full of interest and instructiveness, it would not be well to try a new experiment when it is least likely to succeed. From the fourth year of Henry VII. however, when first they began to be printed, we have thenceforward a full and perfect account of all measures passed in that and every successive Parliament, and from that time to the Restoration let the statutes be made a text book, which shall be got up as a fixed and authoritative nucleus around which the knowledge of those two centuries are bound up. . . . . It is not pretended that the statutes contain all which ought to be known, it would be absurd to suppose it; but they form for every year, and for every period sound and healthy centres of organization, around which all other attainable knowledge ought to be gathered, in order that the outward events which other books furnish may fall into their proper places, and bear their proper significance.”

History studied upon such a system will be worthy of the University, whereas if we are content to take the descriptions, half fact and half fable, which are dashed off by the brilliant wits and eager partisans of the day, we shall be in danger of seeing the University changed into a place of amusement rather than of study, and examiners will no longer ask what is true, but what is new.

There is, moreover, a special defect about the mere acquisition of the philosophic phraseology of the day which does not apply to ancient languages and writers. What is current in life around us is ever variable and inaccurate. It is, as people say, subjective, gathering its exact meaning from ourselves the users. In getting up a Greek philosophy, we are obliged to investigate the real force attached by the ancient writers to their words. This involves the acquisition of something external to ourselves, whereas the literature and current opinions of the day are realized more or less by the help of guess-work and imagination. We must, however, repeat what was said before. Philology and morals are more important as external instruments of higher education than natural science ever can be, because they are, so to say, the complement of theology, and bound up with our eternal interests in a way which the most surprising but transitory phenomena of nature are not.

III. A few words must be said upon the connexion of the educating body with the world external to it.

Mr. Patteson seems to consider that connexion with the State is desirable in order to obviate party objects in its rulers. Now, surely this is quite an uncertainty. In fact, if we regard the one as a philosophical, the other as a political, federation, is it not much more likely that the State will bias the University for its own immediate and variable purposes, than that the University leaders should themselves take up with some line inconsistent with philosophy? Besides which, if the rulers of the University are to be the leading intellectual giants of the day, it is not fit that they should be overruled by others merely because they have the accident of power. He is, however, pointing at a truth. In a perfect state of society, where Church and State are not only connected, but are one, then the University is the nation educating as the Church is the nation worshipping. The more this unity is impaired, the more difficult does the connection of the one with the other become.

It is quite true that the University ought to be in connexion with a body greater than itself. That body is not the State, but the Church. As religion and morals are the life of the higher education, it is clear that the fountain head of religion and of the means of grace, must be the fostering guide. As Mr. Patteson makes a philosophic natural theology come in at the end of study, it is, of course, natural that he should disregard the Church as the quickening element of the University system. Theology is indeed the end, but it is also the beginning, and we hesitate not to say, that in so far as the University cuts itself off from perfect union with the Church, so far does it weaken itself as a sphere of moral and philosophical training.

As the University is a place of education, it is clearly one of the antechambers only of a great building, and there must be a sphere where the education thus given shall be made available. The full results of it will be seen in a future life, but there is also an intermediate sphere in which they must operate. Outwardly and locally that sphere is the State. Vitally and essentially it is the Church. The moment that Church and State have ceased to be identical and coextensive, it is the Church and not the State which remains in living unity with the higher education of the country. The University, therefore, must be in close connection with religion as the handmaid of the Church, or it must fall from the true fulfilment of its office. GOD must be in all our thoughts if our whole life here is a training for communion with Him hereafter. All education must be sanctified, subject, that is, to the sanctifying influence of the Church. This will show the falsehood of Hegel's theory, as stated (p. 244) by Mr. Sanders, in his review of the Philosophy of Right.

160 THE UNIVERSITY AS THE PLACE OF HIGHER EDUCATION.

"In education Church and State have distinct provinces; religion has its peculiar doctrines to inculcate; but directly it comes to trench on science then it enters on the ground appropriated to the State. The State has undoubtedly something lying behind it, something more Divine shadowed forth behind the veil; and this something is approached by faith and feeling, but not so that the approach to it can be employed as a practical means of ruling and guiding men.'

The last sentence is obscure, like much of the rest of the Essay, but as far as it has any gatherable meaning, it seems to imply that the State is fallen from its own high and proper dignity, but that it has still an abiding relation to that higher corporate life of which it was originally to be the exponent. That is really allowing that the State was to be what the Church is. The Church is a new and living form of corporate existence. It is not an appendage to the State for peculiar purposes. It is a reorganization of the members of the State, restoring them to that perfection from which they are fallen, the revelation of that Divine character which was hidden behind the veil. So does the Church satisfy the yearnings of those who set her authority at nought. If Oxford is happy enough still to be working in unity with the Church as a definitely religious place of education, she has our hopes and our prayers that she may continue so to be. She will cease to be a place of higher. education the moment she loses sight of the highest object of education. She must recognize Divine inspiration as the source of her life and the rule of her faith, or she will be unable to accomplish more than that lower education which is for this world only, and will be void of real dignity even here.

The University, no doubt, was in error in standing so long aloof from the study of nature, but we must be very careful not to let slip the study of GOD and man. To let these fall into subordination to that will be a worse error than the former.

We must not expect again to have the monopoly of intellect. It will not even be absorbed in all the Universities together. It has been part of the work of the University to disseminate education, and as the acorns have fallen from the old tree, they have caused the parent's life and vigour to show itself throughout the kingdom. The business of the University is to see that nothing which is known elsewhere is willingly unknown within her gates. Our manufacturing towns will absorb one class of intellect, and our capital cities will be the home of others; but they must all find that the University knows what they are about, appreciates their work, is ready and capable of helping them in their discoveries, and that not as the stirring spirits about themselves, for the sake of gain and worldly interest, but from a high and independent spirit of liberal culture, anxious for the advancement of everything which tends to manifest the glory of GOD, and promote the welfare of mankind.

161

DISSENTING PERIODICALS.-1854.

UNDER the above title we propose from time to time to devote a few pages to the consideration of such members of the prolific periodic press, as represent the various Dissenting interests of the kingdom. All prefatory remarks, as the Hibernian observed, will be kept for the conclusion of the series; remarks, that is, upon the general value of the class, its worth and advantages, its faults and failings, its peculiarities, and its characteristics. Meanwhile, however, it may not be amiss to advertize the reader upon one or two points explanatory of our purpose. The month of October last, as the closing quarter-day of the year-speaking the language of periodicals-seemed a convenient date to select, on which to bring together a single number of each religious periodical published in London, whether quarterlies or monthlies, whether bi-monthlies, weeklies, or occasional serials. This then is the era chosen for illustration. Another thing to be noted is the fact that the great numerical amount of sectarian literature prevents us from examining, in this place, a tithe of the periodicals collected by our indefatigable bookseller. Hence we must of necessity make a selection, and since we are unable to give any credential or proof of unbiassed choice, we are compelled to beg, what every reader, who takes for granted our statements in this matter, will accord, the ascription to our critical judgment of unprejudiced motives in the specimens adduced as fair types of the whole class. Further, we would premise that the reader do not expect in this examination "a high style of criticism." Such, indeed, in the case before us would be much misplaced. Written mostly with a view to circulate denominational intelligence; published in part as a medium of pulpit composition; and purchased for the purpose of satisfying the desire of instruction, rather than of cultivating or of elevating the taste, no high order of writing, of argument, or of style, should be expected, or if expected will be found. Hence, what we discover related, or discussed in plain terms, we shall endeavour to describe, or debate in plain terms; and if in the more intellectual "quarterlies" we find, as we shall discover, traces of intellect and of thought, higher and broader than the average run of sectarian "monthlies," we may be excused for departing, in their favour, from the rule we have thus ventured to lay down for our guidance. With these preliminary cautions we, in the first place, discuss the collection, numerically the strongest, of periodicals published under the guidance of theological opinions of the Baptist school.

No fewer than one-and-twenty monthly magazines appear under

the patronage of the Baptist community. Amongst them we look in vain for any periodical of a higher standard than a six-penny serial; whilst in half-penny, of which there are five; in penny, of which there are four; and in two-penny publications, of which there are six, the denomination fairly eclipse their rivals. The remainder of the list is composed of two six-penny prints; two four-penny; one at three-pence; and one at three-halfpence. Of these magazines thirteen are published with a view to adult information; five are devoted to infantine instruction; and the remaining three record the progress of missionary labour. The class has attained more than the average age of periodicals. The patriarch of the tribe, the Baptist Magazine, par excellence, is at present in the 46th year of his age. Next comes the Baptist Reporter of 29 years; after him three journals of 23 seasons; who are followed by serials respectively aged 19, 18, 17, 12, and 11 years; whilst the rear is brought up by two 9 years old; two 8; one 5; one 3; two 2; and one, the Pot of Manna, whose age we have failed to ascertain. The titles of these journals are for the most part significant. We have the Baptist Magazine, Reporter, General Magazine, Youths', and Children's Magazine (2), and Juvenile Missionary Herald. Some others are less determinate, but still characteristic: -The Millennial Harbinger, Zion's Trumpet, Earthen Vessel, Pot of Manna. Amongst the rest, we find The Church, The Primitive Church Magazine, Gospel Standard and Herald, Appeal, Cheering Words, and Christian Pioneer. The total price of a single copy of all the twenty-one Baptist periodicals amounts to three shillings and seven-pence half-penny.

Of the Baptist Magazine, with which we begin—no less than one-half of the October number is occupied with Missionary and other intelligence, and one-half the remainder is filled with reviews of two books, and what are truly termed, "brief notices of works," -(by some score of miscellaneous writers, in which oftentimes the very title of the book exceeds the review.)-Hence it appears that the "original," or the quasi-original portion of the Baptist Magazine occupies, on a rough calculation somewhat under a fourth part of the whole contents. These papers are seven in number, which may thus be classified, two biographical, one historical, one politicoreligious, and three poetical. The first article is a genuine and an original one-a memoir of a worthy Baptist teacher. The second is an historical sketch of the Baptist Society in Cornwall, and merely consists of "extracts from a paper read at a meeting held at Falmouth." "Judson's last days," the title of the third, is strictly selected; and is copied, with the exception of four lines at the beginning and at the conclusion, by way of introduction and of decent finale, and of a few words in the middle to serve as connecting links, from some essays by Dr. Wayland and by Mrs. Judson on her late husband. The last prose contribution is a portion of