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who, with this Alumnus, find in the transcendentalism of Schleiermacher the true philosophy, must feel or affect the contempt which he felt for the Rationalists and Pelagians. The ground on which they stand, however, is too narrow to afford them a footing. Schleiermacher gave up almost every thing, except the incarnation of God in Christ. This was the centre of his system. Those whom he brought off from Rationalism, have almost all gone on, with the Hegelians, to Atheism, or turned back to the Bible. And so it will be here. Indeed, the man who can see no harm in pantheism, who thinks it a most religious system, and venerates its advocates, as is the case with this Alumnus, has but one step to take, and he is himself in the abyss. We should not, therefore, be surprised to see, in the providence of God, this new philosophy, which is in itself infinitely worse than Socinianism or Deism, made the means of breaking up those deadening forms of error, and while it leads many to destruction, of driving others back to the fountain of life.

What suits the GerHence almost all those

Though, for the reasons stated above, we think it not unlikely that this system will make a certain degree of progress in our country, we have no fear of its ever prevailing, either here or in England, as it does in Germany. Apart from the power of true religion, which is our only real safe guard against the most extravagant forms of error, there are two obstacles to the prevalence of these doctrines among Englishmen, or their descendants. They do not suit our national character. A sanity of intellect, an incapacity to see wonders in nonsense, is the leading trait of the English mind. The Germans can believe any thing. Animal magnetism is for them, as one of the exact sciences. mans, therefore, does not suit us. who, in England or in this country, have professed transcendentalism, like puss in boots, have made them ridiculous. If it was not for its profaneness, what could be more ludicrous than Mr. Emerson's Address? He tells us, that religious sentiment is myrrh, and storax, and chlorine, and rosemary; that the time is coming when the law of gravitation and purity of heart will be seen to be identical, that man has an infinite soul, &c. How much, too, does Dr. Henry look, in Cousin's philosophy, like a man in clothes a great deal too large for him. It will not do. Such men were never made for transcendentalists. This is not meant in disparagement of those gentlemen. It is a real compliment to them, though not exactly to their wisdom. Coleridge is the only

Englishman whom we know any thing about, who took the system naturally. To him it was truth; he was a mystic; he had faith in what he said, for his words were to him the symbols of his own thoughts. It is not so with others. They repeat a difficult lesson by rote, striving hard all the while not to forget.

The Germans keep their philosophy for suitable occasions. They do not bring it into mathematics or history. With us, however, it is far too fine a thing to be kept locked up. If transcendental at all, we must be so always. Marheineke, the first almost in rank of Hegel's scholars, has written a history of the German Reformation, which is a perfect master-piece; perfectly simple, graphic, and natural. From this history, the reader could not tell whether he was a Wolfian, Kantian, or Hegelian; he would be apt to think he was a Christian, who loved Luther and the gospel. Compare this with Carlyle's History of the French Revolution, which is almost as transcendental as Hegel's Encyklopädie. Carlyle is a man of genius, yet his exotic philosophy makes him, as a writer, absurd.

It is not however only or chiefly on this want of adaptation of the German mysticism to the sane English mind, that we would rely to counteract the new philosophy; it is the influence of the Bible on all our modes of thinking. We believe in God the Father, the maker of heaven and earth. We must have a God who can hear prayer. In Germany, the educated classes, little in the habit of attending church, have for generations felt comparatively little of the power of the Bible. There was no settled idea of a personal God, such as is visible in every page of the scriptures, engraven on their hearts. They were therefore prepared for speculations which destroyed his very nature, and were content with a blind instinctive power, productive of all changes, and struggling at last into intelligence in the human race. Such a God may do for a people who have been first steeped in infidelity for generations; but not for those who have been taught, with their first lispings, to say, Our Father who art in heaven. The grand danger is, that this deadly poison will be introduced under false labels; that this atheism, enveloped in the scarcely intelligent formulas of the new philosophy, may be regarded as profound wisdom, and thus pass from mouth to mouth without being understood, until it becomes familiar and accredited. This process is going on before our eyes. It is not to be believed that Dr. Henry, for example, has the

least idea of Cousin's philosophy, which he is forever recommending. Had he any insight into its nature, he would part with his right hand rather than be accessory to its propagation. We feel it to be a solemn duty to warn our readers, and in our measure, the public, against this German atheism, which the spirit, of darkness is employing ministers of the gosple to smuggle in among us under false pretences. No one will deny that the Hegelian doctrines, as exhibited above, is atheism in its worst form; and all who will read the works of Cousin, may soon satisfy themselves that his system, as far as he has a system, is, as to the main point, identical with that of Hegel.

ART. IV.-The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and its Consequences to the Protestant Churches of France and Italy; containing Memoirs of some of the Sufferers in the Persecution attending that event. Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication. William S. Martien, Publishing Agent. 1839. 18mo. pp. 216.

THE public seal of the National Synod of the Reformed Churches in France, as adopted in the year 1583, presented, as its device, a burning bush, with the motto, FLAGROR NON CONSUMOR; a just emblem of Christ's universal church, and of this branch of it in particular. In addition to the interest which every sound Presbyterian naturally feels in the progress of Reformed opinions, and the eventful history of their defenders, we are particularly attracted to the annals of the Huguenots, from the fact that some of the most distinguished families in America are descended from this persecuted race. For piety, refinement of manners, and improvement of mind, they have been surpassed by no one class of citizens; and the

* Another Doctor in New York, according to the public papers, recently declared in an address, that Kant and Cousin were the two greatest philosophers of the age. This simple sentence betrays a world of ignorance. Kant may indeed be spoken of in such terms, because he did destroy one system, and introduce another, which had its day. But Cousin has neither pulled down, nor built up. He has merely transfused into French a weak dilution of German doctrines. He may be a man of learning and talents; this we have no disposition to deny, but to call him one of the two greatest philosophers of the age, only shows how a man or a system may be trumpeted into notoriety, by those who know not whereof they affirm.

remark has often been made, that Divine Providence has signally favoured them with worldly prosperity.

The persecutions which ensued upon the revocation of the edict of Nantes, destroying churches and scattering thousands of exiles, produced such confusion and waste among the manuscript documents of the French churches, that it would now be impossible to gather even the fragments of their history, if it had not been the pious care of devout men in other countries to undertake the task of collection. To none of these compilers do we owe so much as to the Reverend John Quick, of London, a learned and pious minister, who lived during the latter half of the seventeenth century. About the year 1670, Mr. Quick, who had lived at Middleburg in Holland, and there met with many of the pious French refugees, discovered some collections of the manuscript acts of the National Synods, and was filled with a desire to save them from oblivion. More than a hundred and fifty of the exiled clergy afterwards came to London, and Mr. Quick was indefatigable in searching for records. Most of these confessors expressed their fear that the Minutes were irrecoverably lost. After great and anxious inquiry, however, Mr. Quick found in the hands of Mr. Foren, one of the refugees, a copy of these acts. It was extensive, filling nearly a ream of paper, and was tolerably well written, but had been damaged and defaced by moisture, so that the patient antiquary declares that it sometimes took him five hours to decipher as many lines. The manuscript was worthy of such pains, as it had been duly collated with the original, and bore the attestations of many good men. After this, he alighted upon five folios belonging to the consistory of the French church in London, by means of which he corrected the errors and supplied the lacunae of the other. From year to year other manuscripts came into his hands, and among these a folio containing the acts of the first twenty-four synods, and originals of the acts of two synods. The toil of arranging, deciphering, copying, translating, and digesting these papers, was immense: "but my labour," says lie, was a pleasure to me." The result was a work in two folio volumes, comprising more than twelve hundred pages.*

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The title is as follows: Synodicon in Gallia Reformata: or the Acts, Decisions, Decrees and Canons of those famous National Councils of the Reformed Churches in France. Being, I. A most faithful and impartial History of the Rise, Growth, Perfection, and Decay of the Reformation in that Kingdom, with its fatal Catastrophe, upon the Revocation of the Edict of Nants, in the

The size of the book, and the dry and tedious particularity of the annals, have served to keep it too much out of sight, and we take pleasure in gleaning from it some facts which strike us as promising benefit and entertainment.

The origin of the name Huguenot or Hugonot is involved in some obscurity. We have met with no more plausible account of it than that which is adopted by M. Laval, in his History of the Reformation in France. According to this, it was a contemptuous appellation given to the Protestants at the city of Tours, where they were very numerous. "Every city in France," says M. Laval, " had a peculiar word to denominate a bugbear, or a hobgoblin, and other such nonsensical monsters with which old women used to frighten children and simpletons. Now at Tours, they had their King Hugo, who, they say, used every night to ride through the uninhabited places within and without the walls, and to push and carry off those he met in his way. And as the Reformed used to resort to those places to pray to God, and hear the holy word in the night-time, daring not to do it in the day, for fear of being persecuted, they were called Hugonots, after the name of Hugo. M. de Beze, who lived at that very time, and who was at the conference of Poissy in 1561, agrees with M. de Thou about that etymology; from that time to this day the Reformed have been known in France under the name of Hugonots."*

Our desultory notices do not require us to dwell on the introduction of Reformed opinions into France, by means of Calvin and his brethren. In no kingdom of Europe did the gospel make a more triumphant entrance. The bible was translated by Olivetan, uncle of Calvin, and fifty of the psalms were put into French metre by Clement Marot; the remainder appearing afterwards in a version by Beza. Louis Goudimel set these sacred songs to melodies which are sung to this

year 1685. II. The Confession of Faith and Discipline of those Churches. III. A Collection of Speeches, Letters, Sacred Politics, Cases of Conscience, and Controversies in Divinity, determined and resolved by those grave Assemblies. IV. Many excellent Expedients for preventing and healing Schisms in the Churches, and for re-uniting the dismembered Body of divided Protestants. V. The Laws, Government, and Maintenance of their Colleges, Universities and Ministers, together with the Exercise of Discipline upon delinquent Ministers and Church-Members. VI. A Record of very many illustrious Events of Divine Providence relating to those Churches. The whole collected and composed out of original Manuscript Acts of those renowned Synods. A work never before extant in any Language. In two Volumes. By John Quick, Minister of the Gospel in London. London, 1692.

But compare Maclean's note at Mosheim, vi. 372. VOL. XII. NO. I.

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