Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1858-1860, 1858-04-07

Patriarch's own character in the DAYS of his
prosperity, when he had the testimony of the
Almighty that there was none like bin in
the earth, a perfect man and an upright one
who feard God and eschewed evil Ii is re-
markable to find such delneation of charac-
ter-abounding in the most delicate and ex-
quisite touches of pathos and beaufy-in
poet, whose muse il accustomed to soar on
eagles wings, above the clouds, to gaze on
dazzling grandeur with an eagle'se eye, and to
claim the highest heaven of subliraity as her
native home
Now the peculiar excellence of this poetry
is that though it is soft and plaintive as the
lutte, its music, lying deeper than the msre
words, never wearies the ear, its sweetness
never clogs the taste. You may read 1t
hundred times, and you viii find more to
admire on the hundIeth, than ON the first
perusal."
In the chapter on the oratory aud elcquence
of the Bible, the author thus introduces PAUL's
Address to the Athenians, on Mars Hill
aBut If we should single out any of the six
recorded speeches of the apostle. as being the
sublimest triumph of his eloquence, we should
take his address at Athens, before the court of
Areopagus on Mars Hill, although the report
given Of it is but brief compend of what he
said on that occasion. Briefs and skeletons
of sermons are prOverbially dry. But il is not
50 with those of the Scriptures There is a
vital spirit still breathing in every word and
sentence of these inspired fragments. The one
now before US possesses peculiar interest,
from the fact that il was the first meeting at
least on anything like grand scale of the
eloquence of Jerusalem with that of Athens.
1t was the first formal and direct assault,
which this new and foreign religion, called
Christianity, had yet made upon the fables of
the ancient classical mythology in the home
of their nativity and the citadel of their
strength. Many triumphs it had won in Ephe-
sus and other cities of Asia Minor. Some
thing too had been achieved in the chief cities
OF Macedonia. But this was now the first
PRONUNCIATION of the truth to the Greeks
themselves on their own classic soil. Ii was
the first direct collision between the educated
imaginative mind of the Asiatic world, and
the educated mind OF the highly polished,
artistic people of the European world. 1t was
Shem and Japheth coming together after long
centuries of separation, each bringing the re-
ligious system he had been perfecting for
ages at last to try their strength, on the
arena of reason and argument, in an open
contest for the mastery of the world. Verscd
as Paul was, from his singular advantages of
genealogy, nativity and education, both in
the learning of the East and the West, and
able, even before his endowment with the gift
brew, and 10 the Greeks in Greek. he was
eminently fitted to represent the cause of
Christianity, at this Athehian meeting Of the
two worlds, the two races and the two relig
ions. We can well imagine with what enthu
siasm, and with what yearning desire to save
souls, such a man as Paul must have trOd, for
the first time, the classic soil of Attica-the
far-famed land of poetry and the arts of he
roes and sages of temple-crOwned hills and
oil frIn nf foin
bright skies and balmy air; and how he
would feel when at last he stood within the
gates of that proud city, which was the boast
of Greece, the shrine of genius, the home Of
art, the cradle of philosophy, but at the same
time the seat of every false god And so, we
are told, that while tarrying at Athens for
his companions, 'his spirit stirred within
him when he saw such city wholly given to
idOlatry.
Disputing first with his own countrymen
there in the synagogue, as was his custom
wherever he went, and then with all others
whom he met, from day to day in the market
place, he was, after awhile, encountered by
company of Epicurean and Storic philoso-
pliers. who brought him to the great council
hall of the city on the top of Mars Hill, in
order to hear more fully what this babbler
and setter forth of strange gods had to say.
In that place the Athenians-protessed teach
ers, poets, rhetoricians, critics, philosophers,
logicians-werc accustomed to meet daily for
the purpose of telling or hearing some new
thing In that place also the highest court
of the city was accustomed To hold its ses-
sions. In that very Hall the great Socrates,
four centuries before, had been arTaigned,
tried and condemned to death, on this same
charge of intoxicating the worship of strange
gods. Now, if ever the three ele-
ments OF great occasion, great subject, and
Il great man conspred together To give the
eloquent Athenians a specimen of u great
speech, it was the case when this lone but
fearless ambassador of the true God, knowing
rs he did, the absolute certainty of all that
he preached, stood up in that venerable Hall
which erst had rung with the clarion voice of
Demosthenes. to proclaim the sublime truths
of Christianity TO these worshippcrs of the
unknown God Feeling the dig
nifty of his position, he rises to the majesty of
the scene:
'Ye men of Athens. perceive that in all
things ye are too approximations Cor rather
We are ovcrmuch devOut). For as | passed
and behcld your devotons, found an altar
with this inscription To the unknown God
Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him
declare | unto you, &C.
But we pass beyond Our space in our ex-
tracts. Besides the bardS and orators, there
are ESSAYS on the Types of Female character
in the Bible" Representative young Men of
the Bible" Science and the sages of the
Bible" and "Original Conceptions or, OBJ
jects of Sublimity and Beauty in the Bible''-
in each of which there is much for admira-
ton.