The Press.
London, England, 1856-03-29 00:00:00

cular opinions advanced, Dr. Joremie says, in
a brief preface :

A posthumous work is necessarily imperfect, and dis-
courses intended for oral delivery would doubtless have
gained much in terseness of style and diction by a careful
preparation for the press; but even in their present form
these sermons will be found to be of no ordinary merit.
They are marked by the same originality and vigour of ex-
pression, the same richness of imagery and illustration,
the same large views and catholic spirit, and the same
depth and fervour of devotional feeling, which so remark-
ably distinguished the preceding series, and which ren-
dered it a most valuable accession to our theological
literature.

That is high praise from so eminent a quarter,
and it i 3 amply deserved. We receive these
sermons with great pleasure, and we also wel-
come them as a valuable addition to our
theological library.
But as the fame of Mr. Archer Butler is
likely to be much discussed in religious circles,
we think it right to record our sentiments on
his teaching. Dr. Jeremie hints at "diffuseness"
in the style of these sermons. In the present, or
even in the preceding series, we were not so
much struck with that particular fact as with a
certain ambiguity running through the logic
of the compositions. Archer Butler was not a
Puseyite, and he disliked " party names," and
never was there a theologian more out of sym-
pathy with the neologieal esoterics of the
modern German (No) Church. We think,
indeed, that his finest passages are protests
against rationalism in all its forms. He was
a thorough Christian in his belief ; but so
strong was his appreciation of purely hierar-
chical institutions, that much of his teaching
would suit the confines of the debateable land
between Rome and the Reformed Churches.

Facts in biography often throw a flood of
light upon the higher manifestations of a
man's intellect. Mr. Archer Butler was born
a member of a Roman Catholic family, in the
county of Tipperary. He belonged to the
Butlers of Garnavilla, an undoubted strip of
the great race of Or►nond. some of whose
services have been commemorated in our
columns for their valour in the Crimea.
" Charming Kate of Garnavilla" (the theme
of Lysaght's celebrated song) was the aunt of
the eminent divine before us. Mr. Archer
Butler had a Catholic father, and a Protestant
mother. At an early period he examined the
questions between the rival creeds, and, though
reared a Catholic, he became a Protestant,
and entered the Church. The Irish branch
of the Church Establishment has reasons to
be proud of his homage to " the true faith
established amongst us." Yet, unquestion-
ably, on some points in his works there is a
strong tinge of that philosophy which is
parallel to some Romanist doctrines. He
appears to have studied Bossuet and Massil-
lon, and the great Galilean divines, and in
his mode of using the word " Church " there
is considerable ambiguity. A spiritualised
theocracy seems to us to have bcen always
hovering before his imagination, though he
did not confess it in so many words. He was
Protestant in all that related to the Atone-
ment and the truth of Scriptures, but on
Church polity he was more hierarchical than
we could approve. This ambiguity resulted,
we have no doubt, from the effects of his early
education.

We do not think, therefore, that Archer
Butler can be recommended as a divine who
attained a distinct synthesis of his own, but on
collateral branches of the Christian schemc
his talents, his earnestness, and eloquence,
must secure him a large audience. Poetry,
philosophy, and theology were blended in his
nat .re, and his sermons are full of truths and
sublime aspirations. His great gift lay in
making intellectual men devout, and we think
that he required an academical audience.
For common congregations he was too deep;
but there is a large class of learned and devout
readers of theology who will be specially in-
terested in these sermons. We were much
struck with the first series, to which Doctor
Jeremie alludes, and we think this volume
us au improvement.

The manner in which this divine passes
from general and philosophic views to a per-
sonal application of principles is a peculiarity
in his rhetoric. Thus, in the discourse on
" Christ, the Restorer of Mankind," before
appealing to the truth of Revelation, the

THE PRESS.

preacher states " the theory of useful preju-
dice," as propounded by mere utilitarians.
This passage is remarkable for its expository
power :

Nor again will it solve the problem to reply (in a more
reverent but still a mistaken spirit) that a corps of moral
instructors is felt by statesmen to be expedient, and by
good men to be obligatory. There is some truth in this,
but it is far indeed from the whole truth. The pertina-
cious vitality of Christianity (I speak, you will under-
stand, only of its secondary and earthly causes) depends
neither on statesmen nor on good men. The statesman is
too careless and too interested to labour continuously to
preserve it; the good men are too weak and too few. No ;
Christian establishments, the general organisation of
Christian services in countries, are built upon a broader
basis than occasional policy or even occasional virtue :
Christianity can only be universally recognised because it
speaks to universal humanity. We may curse it in our
wickedness an•t flout it in our folly, but we cannot wholly
tear it from our hearts. It is based on too firm a founds•
tion of knowledge of man's wants and weakness ; the
chord it touches is too genuine; the aspect it displays is
too exquisitely adapted to console our miseries ; it speaks
too direct a language to our common unhappiness, to be
ever wholly and irretrievably rejected by the general people.
All history confirms the fact. Nations have run through
the whole cycle of caprices ; they have chased and aban•
doned a thousand cherished pursuits ; but I know not of
one that ever permanently rejected, after enjoying it, the
blessing of a Christian worship. Ambition may forget
heavenly in the pursuit of earthly greatness, rank may
feel too fortified in position and wealth too strong in gold,
to feel the constant necessity of the Great Physician, but
as of old " the common people " will still " hoar Him
gladly." And then, as to moral education, if that were
indeed all that was required, have we not our men of
fancy and our men of thought? If a corps of ordained
philosophers would suit the wants of an unhappy world, the
numbers ambitious of distinction in the pursuits of mind
would always be sufficient to supply the demand.
But the world, in all its corruption, nevertheless feels and
knows that such guides would leave its wants ungratified.
They may expound the malady, but they can poorly tell
the cure. They can ally themselves with every folly as
well as with every virtue ; and, whatever influence they
may have over our hours of calm, they are lost in the tem-
pest of the passions, unheard or despised when " deep is
calling to deep," when the flood-gates are burst and the
winds are up !

What then is that which these teachers cannot bring,
and which that higher and more hallowed order of instruc-
tors professes to bring? What is that which in spite of
corruption and frailty, in spite of evil-speakers that aggra-
vate the corruption and evil-doers that exemplify and dis-
seminate it—what is that which even in its very perversions
has a power not wholly perished, and in its severest cen-
sures a secret and impressive commendation to the very
hearts that practically reject it—what is that which has
revolutionised the domination of selfishness in the world,
till in times of trouble and change we hear the people cry
aloud that they will stand by their teachers as long as they
stand by their teaching, and that they will never consent
to exchange them for the frigid apostles of a pretended
rationalism? Brethren! the answer to the question is
supplied in the assertion of the doctrine taught—Christ
has the power, because even in its lowest form it preaches
hope and restoration to man. Because even the most neg-
ligent feel that it speaks the words of the text—" I will
restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy
wounds."

Then how finely he passes into the subjective
element, and appeals to the internal voice :

The faith in the Christian sacrifice and its attendant
revelation of the Divine character, alone answer the de-
mands of the heart and reason of man for a higher state
of moral perfection. I am well aware how feebly this
voice is heard in the ordinary course of the world ; man
could scarcely be deemed a fallen creature, if the eon-
sciousness of his fall were so universal as to prompt the
continual demand for his restoration. But it would also
be an over-statement to say that we have not a desire
for something better, as well as for something happier,
than this earthly state admits. Men do weary of the
wickedness of the world as really, though not indeed so
frequently, as of its disappointments. This is not the
place for laboured discussions, and I will simply refer you
to one powerful instance of this anxiety for a better
and holier condition. I allude to cases of private and
personal injury. lieflect upon your emotion in such
instances. There is surely something more than mere
resentment; there is a strong sense of hijustice, and
naturally connected with it (as the mind calms and dif-
fuses its feelings) a melancholy impression of the lost
moral balance of the whole world, and a correspondent
yearning for abodes where righteousness shall be a prin
ciple of universal action. I specify these cases, not because
the feeling is there more real, but because it is more in-
tense and defined. But, brethren, all these aspirations are
in our faith met and satisfied. Is it not its pre eminent
character to unveil before our eyes a kingdom where
immortally dwelled' righteousness? Is not its great
Sacrifice the corner-stone of the equity of the whole moral
universe—the Sacrifice that enables God to he at once
" just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus " ?
Here then is the preaching of Christ crucified recom-
mended to the reason and to the heart, Here, in the

beauty of its holiness, is a cause of its lingering power
over the better affections even of those who have no
strength to realise its commands. It establishes •
righteous Governar upon the throne of Heaven ; it de-
velopes the symmetry of all his judgments ; it answers the
inward appeal of the frail and wretched beings who can
" know the better," even while they " the worse prefer."

SATURDAY,

The following passage is a burst of argu-
mentative eloquence, and is most crushing in
its assaults on those rationalists who admit
the truth of Scriptures, and yet wish to
" unmimcle Christianity":—

To oppose the uniform belief of the Church (which in-
deed has rather inclined to exaggerate than to depreciate
the dignity of the Virgin Mother), to oppose the unequi-
vocal testimony of Scripture, there seems to be (except
the utterly unsuccessful attempt to discredit the genuine.
ness of the narration) but one universal objection—the
same to this as to all other doctrines that transcend °nib
nary experience—that the thing is an incomprehensible
" mystery." The Church is in this holy season peculiarly
busied with her mysteries: I cannot then but pause, while
speaking of the great mystery declared in the text, to ask,
are we indeed the fools these men would paint us to believe;
such ? They would have a Christianity purged of myste-
ries or none ; a Christianity without trinity of persons, or
duality of natures, or miraculous conception, or atoning
redemption, or sanctifying Spirit; and all these exclusions
equally, because they are mysteries. They are told that the
object of this religion is to bring together earth and
heaven—a world which we know little with a world of
which we know nothing; and they expect to have the de-
tails of such a conjunction level to their capacities. They
are told that God has interfered with the fortunes of man,
and they expect the mighty transaction to proceed as
simply as an ordinary treaty of peace. They admit that
God has condescended to enlighten his creatures, yet they
are obstinate in refusing to take anything from Him on
trust. They concede that the preliminaries of ages were
not considered too much to herald the Advent of this great
epoch ; that that " day " seen through the vista of two
thousand years was enough to make glad the heart of one
patriarch—nay, that the.patriaroh of the human race him-
self was permitted to see in it the source of all his conso-
lation ; that a polity singular in the history of the world was
for centuries maintained for the sole purpose of evidencing
and illustrating and preparing it; that miracles and pro-
digies, each enough to make the foundation of a separate
system , were, aggregated together, only worthy to be the
faint precursors of this master wonder; that figures, each
worthy alone to occupy the full breadth and height of an
ordinary painting, were only the accessories of the mighty
and prominent form of that mystic Being who fills the
foreground of the Christian picture ; and yet, admitting
all, or nearly all this, obliged to confess that, explain it as
we may, the whole subject comes to us from on high and
clothed in the light of other worlds, these objectors—
though drenched in mysteries, when they come to the
scriptural testimonies to the miraculous conception, and
personal dignity, and mystical offices of Christ—suddenly
assume the utmost minuteness of sceptical caution, set to
work every refinement of criticism to extort inanity out of
expressions the most positive and unequivocal, stamp folly
on the Old Testament in order to rationalise the New, cor•
tend implicitly (in this endeavour to uniniraele the advent
and the person of Christ) that the vast organisation of
Judaism was after all a preparation in which nothing was
prepared, a porch without an edifice, a cypher without a
solution; in abort, after groping through a labyrinth of
preliminary mystery, refuse to acknowledge that mystery
which alone can make all the rest cease to be such !
That passage is taken from " The Advent
Exalts Human Relations," and was preached
for a lying•in hospital. The preacher con-
tinues in a strain that reminds us of the old
French pulpit :
But you, my friends, I trust, have not " so learned
Christ" or Christ's gospel. You are willing to concede to
your adorable Master that dignity which really exalt{ our
nature by exalting His ; you are willing to admit that He,
and she who bore the hallowed title of His earthly mother,
were connected in ties such as they alone have ever held;
you are willing to acknowledge that in that awful hour of
Bethlehem there must have mingled with the sorrows of
the outcast virgin the trembling joys of one who knew
herself the supernatural channel of the hope of the human
race; and that, though she might own to the feebleness
of the woman in that hour of trial, and deplore amid the
unworthy accompaniments of such a scene that " low
estate " of " the handmaid of the Lord" which had re-
duced her to them, yet that, as she gazed upon that eternal
child in whom was bound the regeneration of Israel, of
the world, "her soul could magnify the Lord," "and her
spirit rejoice in God her Saviour !"
In his youth Butler must have often (as a
Catholic) invoked the Blessed Virgin ; and
we think that we can see traces of the practice
in these discourses.
From the sermon on "The Will of God
towards His Children " we take the following
thrilling appeal:—
This awful truth,—that between the world's glory and
God's glory there is a variance which no art of sell delu-
sion can reconcile ; that no human heart can idolise the
one and truly adore the other; that if you will indeed
struggle for the eternal prize you must silence every pulse
of worldly ambition. tear from the soul every longing
desire fur the miserable excitements that consume awiy
your years—and, receiving a new nature, cast yourselves in
trembling hope and all the lowliness of infancy, as " little
ones," at the feet of God—this seems to many " a hard
doctrine "—" Who can bear it?" T. some it is " enthu-
siasm " (the world never wants a name to stigmatise troth
with ),—to some it is "fanaticism,"—to some again it is
"hypocrisy." Brethren ! we cannot pare, and shape, and
fashion Christianity to suit any man or body of men. It
is the unalterable decree of God as promulgated in his
Word, that the sinful nature can never behold the sinless
glories of Ilia kingdom, that it is only as justified by the
humble faith which is the characteristic of these " little