The Press.
London, England, 1854-07-22 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

admit that there is a spice of humour in the
author coming before the literary world
under such a homely appellation. The
nature of the book resembles those com-
mentaries on the Bible which Mr. W. J.
Fox used to deliver on Sundays to iesthetical
sceptics and to " anti-supernaturalists" (that is
the phrase), who liked to hear God's Church
criticised artistically, as if it were an ingenious
invention of human contrivance. Infidelity
has as many schools as Popery; and "the
false original" is one of its greatest impos-
tures. Germany has much to answer for in
developing this school, which audaciously
propounds and arrogantly dogmatises without
any other reference than to the fleeting sensa-
tion produced by charlatanic genius on igno-
rant dupes.
The writer of this work pretends to sys-
tematise the course of Providence into five
acts, with prologues and epilogues of the
author's composition. In act the first we have
the " Hebrew Mission ;" then the Greek and
Roman " Missions" fill up the second and
third acts, in the latter of which the new or
Christian drama, being the free aspect of the
original Jewish mission, or its feminine corre-
lative (tic) (p. vii.), commences. The fourth
and fifth acts are occupied with " National" and
" Universal Missions. The author begins his
" first prologue" thus :
The design of this book is, with old materials, to throw
a new and permanent ray of light upon the whole history
of man. It is called" The Divine Drama," because it is an
outline of the progress of human society, in such methodical
form as to give it the likeness of a magnificent providen-
tial drama, the archetype of the inferior drama which
human genius has constructed, and the source from which
it has unconsciously derived its inspiration. This
dramatic arrangement of history illustrates the principles
on which the science of historical analogy is based ; it
exemplifies it in its greatest and its leading features ; and
presents its facts like strata of rocks in superincumbent
position—so indelibly fixed upon the records of ages,
that every individual may study the subject in con-
fidence that what he studies is as truly a system of
divine adjustment as botany, zoology, geology, or
astronomy.
The prologue in this instance is perfectly
suited to " Rev. James Smith's " dramatic per
formance. It is a key to the false logic and
inflated rhetoric of this strange production.
After indicating his historical analogy the
author then tells us that " his dramatic ar-
rangement" * "presents its facts like
strata of rocks iu superincumbent positions"—
thus jumping as he pleases from a theatrical
to a geological analogy, and so on throughout
the volume. This work is that of an idealising
materialist, who dresses up facts in a fanciful
manner, imagines theories instead of induct-
ing them, and with a fluid style full of sesqui-
pedalian words, and an affectation of a
scientific method, would fain be accepted as a
seer, divining the course of Providence in his-
tory.
We once heard something very like the style
of this deceptions and disagreeable work. Two
or three years since one of our most eminent
" Liberal " contemporaries noticed a certain
lecturer in such complimentary terms that we
ventured to hear one of his discourses. Wo
were not induced to repeat the experiment.
The performance was meant to be fascinating,
and, like the work before us, it was only fan
tastic. A sort of transient vitality was by a
galvanic effort given to the skeletons of de-
funct infidel theories. The Bible was discussed
as if it were a first-class novel, and the career
of Providence, in the past, present, and to
come, marked out with a coolness that was
meant to be astonishing, but which was only
absurd. The lecturer did not answer to the
name of " Rev. James Smith, M.A." He res-
ponded to a Scotch appellation, and, like this
work before us, his system of thinking was a
mechanical mixture of fragments of Mr. Tho-
mas Carlyle, Mr. Emerson, Theodore Parker,
and that late eminent philosopher, Mr. Thomas
Paine. Much of the criticism applicable to
that lecturer is fitted for the work before us.
Its bold assertions, and presumptuous claims
to novelty, might be imposing but for the in
coherency of its logic, and the patent absur-
dity of its matter. Here is one of the most
rational passages in the book :
The five great missions of the universal body are
beautifully analogous to the five senses of the individual
body. The hearing and its limited mission, and the sight
with its extensive and universal mission, characterise tie
two extremes. The audible word was given to Israel, con-