Page images
PDF
EPUB

creation are meant six periods of very long duration-a thousand or a million of years each perhaps. Mr. Winning adopts this theory, and improves upon it. He observes that, "in the first chapter of Genesis, we are told of beasts of the earth, of herbs and trees upon the earth; in the second, of beasts of the field, and plants of the field (or cultivated land) ;" and he accounts for this by supposing, "that early in the sixth period of creation, before the creation of man, the earth was occupied by animals and a vegetation but ill-suited to the comfort of the human race; and that upon the creation of man, there were formed other animals and another vegetation expressly adapted to the last and noblest work of God." This is an ingenious, and, as far as I know, a novel theory, and the Hebrew words will certainly bear it out. But there are, I think, two objections to it-first, the objection before alluded to, that the sacred text speaks of six days only, each of which consisted of a morning and an evening. We know, indeed, that, with God," one day is as a thousand years." Still, to tax an interpretation of scripture is a liberty which should be avoided if possible. The second objection is, that no assignable time is found for the destruction of those numerous races of animals whose fossil remains constitute a great part of the entire bulk of many strata. They were not destroyed at the flood, because Noah was commanded to take into the ark, "of every thing of all flesh, two of each sort," with a view to their preservation. What then is become of the megatherium, the mastodon, the ornitho cephalus, and a number of other land animals, both great and small? Not to mention the tribes of sauri, and the countless species of marine productions, of which there are, I believe, as many extinct species as those which still exist. When are we to date the extinction of all this animal race? It is not the gradual wearing out of some few species, but, as it would seem, the total and sudden destruction of a whole population.

May I be allowed to state what appears to me the simplest and most satisfactory solution of the question. It is, I think, to be found in the two first verses of the bible. "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." This amounts to a simple revelation that the material world is not eternal or self-existent, but that it was originally ("in the beginning") created out of nothing, by the power of God. "By faith," says St. Paul," we understand that the worlds were framed by the power of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." " And the earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep." This is usually thought to be a description of the state of this planet from the time of its creation, till its adaptation to the use of man. Thus, Milton describes it as

[blocks in formation]

But the words of scripture by no means necessarily bear this construction. They may be limited to the state of the earth immediately before the Adamic creation. They admit of the supposition that this

planet may have been peopled and desolated many successive times before it was reduced to the state of darkness and chaos in which it was found when "the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the deep," and this fair earth was fashioned for the abode of intelligent beings, "when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy." In this period, then, between the creation and the chaos, ages may have rolled more numerous than the mind of man can count; and this period I would make over and grant, without reserve, to geologists as their undisputed property. Here they might roam at their pleasure," in endless mazes lost;"-here they might have as many revolutions and remodellings of the earth as they please, and make this planet pass through a thousand changes and chances by flood and by fire;-here they might build castles, and pull them down without limitation or hindrance, and what is more, without the slightest fear of violating or tampering with the sacred text. The six days, and all the circumstances of the Adamic creation, would stand just as we find them.

Mr. Winning quotes, from Dr. Nares' works, a passage which appears to him to contain a difficulty:-" I am at a loss," he says, "to understand what the object can have been of his (God's) delivering up this goodly planet to the sole use of a multitude of strange animals, for a great length of time, without any contemporary beings of higher qualities." But I see no reason for concluding that there could have been no intelligent beings, because we find no human fossils. Why should we suppose the human form only capable of intelligence? Is it "a thing incredible" that other creatures, the mammoths for instance, may have been the rational animals of a former creation? or, if this be looked upon as too wild a theory, even for an ante-Adamic geologist, (and it is impossible to expatiate in such fields without some bewilderment of mind,) I confess I do not see the necessity of supposing that there were any intelligent beings. Any one who reads the 26th chapter of Paley's Natural Theology will, I think, be impressed with the feeling, that this would be " happy world after all"-quite worthy of the benevolence of Godeven though man were blotted out from the catalogue of creatures.

a

Perhaps we rate our own importance in the scale of creation too high, when we think that all things were made with reference to ourselves. We may be, after all, but an anomaly amongst the works of God, or, if I may so speak, an experiment of the compatibility of a rational soul, and free agency with an organic body. But it is time to stop, or we shall wander into unprofitable speculations. My object is merely to lay before your readers what appears to me a satisfactory mode of reconciling the theories of all the geologists with the Mosaic account of creation, without, in the slightest degree, departing from the sacred W. G.

text.

Lichfield, March 11th, 1835.

PRAYERS AND SERMON.

MR. EDITOR,-How comes it, advanced as we are all supposed to be in knowledge and criticism, that that form of worship which adorns our Zion, of all that have ever been framed* "the most comprehensive, most exact, and most inoffensive," to which, when the sacredness of the place is added, nothing but our own endeavours are wanted to make our worship "the beauty of holiness," that such a form should be so little valued as to be unable of itself to attract a congregation? I allude not so much to the sad falling off of national piety, exemplified by the almost total neglect of that pious injunction in our Prayer Books which orders daily prayer to be said, and the people to resort to the church to pray with the minister-some great change must take place in this nation ere this blessed practice is revived-but to as sorrowful a sign of the depreciation of public prayer which cannot muster a decent congregation even on the Lord's day without the addition of a sermon. My object is not so much to enter on any remarks on the comparative value of prayers and the sermon, which have been already put forward in an able manner in a former Number,† but to bring the subject before the notice of your readers, more especially the clergy, hoping that it may remind them of their duty to do all in their power towards dispelling the dangerous error that prevails on the subject. It will be borne in mind that our church only appoints one sermon on the Sunday, thinking probably with Bishop Mant, "That a greater plenty than this may perhaps turn not to our nourishment, but only create in us a waste and wantonness, and that that appetite in many after a multitude of sermons is no other than that of the Israelites, when, not content with the regular provision of their daily manna, 'they required meat for their lusts.''

I fear that there is too much reason for making the application of these words to professing Christians of the present times. The weekly prayers are attended commonly by scarcely a sufficient number of persons to form a congregation, whilst, with the addition of a sermon once or twice a week, they are favoured with a large attendance; and if nothing else was wanting to shew which part of the service is the attraction, the day on which this duty is performed is constantly called "Lecture-day." As tending in its degree to keep up this undue preference, I cannot but dislike the practice which prevails here and there of the pulpit being always occupied by the rector, and the desk as regularly by the curate. In the metropolis there exists a practice which is, I think, still more prejudicial-I allude to the pampered taste for preaching which is engendered by the alternate preacher system. It is not unusual for a chapel to be served by two morning preachers, officiating on alternate Sunday mornings, while the morning prayers, and the whole of the afternoon duty belong to a third, who is frequently spoken of as being "only reader." This practice has, I think, a two-fold evil-invidious comparisons are formed be

Preface to Comber's Companion to the Temple.

+ British Mag. No. 11I.

Mant's Common Prayer, p. 564.

tween the two preachers, and the church is neglected on the Sunday on which the favourite does not occupy the pulpit. "The reader" never takes the place of the preacher in the morning, but is allowed to perform that part of the service in the afternoon, when the church, owing to the caprice of fashion, or the disinclination which prevails to attending afternoon service, is comparatively empty. This again contributes to the bad state of feeling which I have been remarking. The observations of the judicious Hooker,* on the religious temperament of the times in which he lived, together with the result proceeding therefrom, merit attention. As a means of reviving that attachment+ which once existed to public worship, to the inexpressible spiritual advantage of Christians, and to that peculiarly excellent form of worship which distinguishes our church, I would submit to the clergy, with the greatest deference, the expediency of constantly setting before their congregations the precious treasure which they possess in the Liturgy, which they will execute best by shewing that there is not a doctrine essential to christianity which is not therein contained, that doctrine and practice are so intimately blended together that all the benefit derivable from sermons may be equally deduced from her sublime aspirations of piety as contained in the prayers and exhortations, and that nothing is wanting to make it a most "reasonable service." This was the constant practice of the pious rector of Bemerton, whose method in this style of preaching would be highly useful in the present day. Practical illustrations of the Liturgy were generally the burthen of his discourses; and on inquiring if such a practice was of any real efficacy, we find that his two daily services were attended so well that "when the saint's bell rung to prayers some would even leave their ploughs, that they might also offer to God their devotions with him, and would then return back to their plough."

Would to God that a portion of this spirit had fallen on the present age. We may, with the eye of faith, look forward to that glorious

There is crept into the minds of men, at this day, a secret, pernicious, and pestilent conceit, that the greatest perfection of a Christian man doth consist in discovery of other men's faults, and in wit to discourse of our own profession. When the world most abounded with just, righteous, and perfect men, their chiefest study was the exercise of piety; their scope was obedience, ours is skill; their endeavour was reformation of life, our virtue nothing but to hear gladly the reproof of vice; they, in the practice of their religion, wearied chiefly their knees and hands, we especially our knees and tongues. We are grown, as in many things else, so in this, to a kind of intemperancy which (only sermons excepted) hath almost brought all other duties of religion out of taste. At least, they are not in that account and reputation which they should be. Now, because men bring all religion in a manner to the only office of hearing sermons, if it chance that they who are thus conceited do embrace any special opinion different from other men, the sermons that relish not that opinion can in no wise please their appetite. Such, therefore, as preach unto them, but hit not the string they look for, are respected as unprofitable, the rest as unlawful, and indeed no ministers, if the faculty of sermons want.-Hooker, vol. ii. p. 490.

↑ We come by troops to the place of assembly, that being bonded as it were together, we may be supplicants enough to besiege God with our prayers; these forces are to him acceptable.- Tertul. Apolog. i. 39.

Mr. G. Herbert's Life in Walton, vol. ii. p. 65.

time when "they shall no more teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least to the greatest;" but the work of prayer and praise will never cease as long as the world endureth, and the latter will only cease then to be renewed in more sublime strains to last throughout eternity. How happy then should we feel in thus having a shadow of good things to come? Having been long of opinion that the subject of this communication is one meriting the most serious attention on behalf of the clergy, I have ventured on the above remarks. W. B. H.

RUBRIC IN COMMUNION SERVICE.

SIR,-In your number for February, there is a letter from your correspondent "B.," on the violation of the rubric in the communion service, in which he alludes to a correspondence which took place through the medium of your Magazine between him and me on this subject last summer.

Now I still contend that we have no rubric to guide us as to the place where the exhortation ought to be read. Your correspondent quotes the rubric incorrectly by the interpolation of the word "immediately," which would strengthen his argument that the exhortation ought to be read from the pulpit. By the rubric the minister is directed to read the exhortation after the sermon or homily, but no place is named.

I also still maintain that the rubrics before the Nicene Creed and the exhortation contradict each other; and in this opinion I have just discovered I am borne out by Wheatly. The following are his remarks on the former rubric, quoted in Mant's Prayer Book :

"But by another rubric, just before the exhortation, this is supposed to be done after the sermon. For there it is ordered, that when the minister giveth warning for the celebration of the holy communion, (which he shall always do upon the Sunday or some holy day immediately preceding,) after the sermon or homily ended, he shall read the exhortation following.' The occasion of this difference was the placing of this rubric of directions' at the last review before the rubric concerning the sermon or homily. For by all the old Common Prayer Books, immediately after the Nicene Creed the sermon was ordered; and then after that, 'the curate was to declare unto the people whether there were any holy days or fasting days in the week following, and earnestly to exhort them to remember the poor, by reading one or more of the sentences, as he thought most convenient by his discretion.' This was the whole of that rubric then. All the remaining part was added at the Restoration, as was also the rubric above cited just before the exhortation."

From this passage, and the general practice now adopted, it would seem the exhortation includes the warning-that they are, in fact, synonymous terms, and the minister's giving warning, "in whatever form of words he may think fit," is superfluous.

I do not know why your correspondent should repeat that the whole, and not a part only, of the exhortation should be read, since I concluded my letter by remarking I had rather the sermon should be curtailed than the exhortation.

I remain, Sir, yours &c., M. N.

« PreviousContinue »