Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1867-05-05


kind of speech, carried on rs in a
mothers bosom, their faith is whole
somely built up, by which they
make sure that God made the
visible universe. Those who despise
these words as too simple, will, he says,
fall miserahly and he beseeches God
not to let any trample on the unfiedged
Bird that thus stretches himself be-
yond the guardian nest and to send
His Angel to replace Il az the nest, that
Il may TIE, aH It con fy.' He himself
explains the Heaven created, to
mean the Spiritual and Incorporeal crea-
ton, which is always face to ace with
God and the Earth the formless
matter of which the Corporal creation
was afterwards formed. The meaning
In which the words are understood by
the vulgar, he admits not to be true
but he says that ever those hopeful
little ones who think them So are bene-
fitted, because the words of the Book do
net alright them, but deliver high
things lowlily, and with few words a
eopious meaning.
When Moses wrote these things, he
says, he intended that which, among
the meanings, chiefly exeels, both for
light of truth, and f%ruitfulness of profit
And, in another work he declares that
amid such a multitude of true meanings
~extractable from a few words we ought,
If practicable, first to choose that which
it certainly appears the writer meant; if
that is impractieable, then that which
the context does not forbid, and s0hich Is
consistent Nth sound faith; but if we
have to choose, we must prefer only that
which sound faith prescribes, to the
meaning which the context requires.
The expression, that man was made
after the image and likeness Of God, he
understands iguratively, as meaning
that man is made spiritual, renewed in
the knowledge of God, after His image /:
and, in the Church, he says, are those
who are spiritually set over, and those
also who spiritually are subject to those
that are set over them , in which way
God made man male and female, in His
spiritual grace, where, according to the
sex of body, there is neither male or
female. Il do not see,' be says, what
should hinder me from thus understand
ing the fgurative sayings of the Book.
For l know a thing to be manifoldly sig
nifed by corporeal expressions, which
is understood one way by the mind and
that understood many ways in the
mind, which is signified but one way by
corporal expressions By the fruits
of the EARTH given Adam for food, he
says, were signiied, and figured in an
allegory the works of mercy which are
provided for the necessities Of this life,
out of the fruitful earth Such, he says,
were Onesiphorus and the Macedonian
brethren, who contributed to supply
PAUL's wants. 'The image and likeness
Of God,' he says elsewhere, are 'the
power of Reason and Understanding
Our orthodoxy is that of the great
Bishop of Hiopo, and for6ids us to accept
literally what in the Scriptures is at
war, when taken literally, with
plain reason or with the ~undeniable
truths of science, or with those plainly
and directly revealed by Gods first rev.
elation, the universe, and not coming to
us through the medium of human testi-
mony.
Saint AUGUSTINE confirms, also, the
saying, that there has always been one
meaning of religious writings and sym
bols for the vulgar, and another for the
select few. 'WereI, , he says, to indite
anything to have supreme authority,
1 should prefer so to write, That what
ever truth any could apprehend in those
matters, might be conveyed in my
words, rather than set down my own
meaning so clearly as to exclude the
rest, which, not being false, could
not offend me- With the lati-
tude Of Interpretation allowed by
him, and each interpreter deeming
himself inspired, no wender a multitude
of sects grew up, even in the first ages of
Christianity. He says "Thou, o my
God, hadst already taught me by won
derful and mysterious ways, and there
fore believe that Thou taughtest me,
because 10 is truth; nor is there besides
Thee any teacher of Truth, where or
whencesoever it may shine upon us ~
and al viii say the Truth, Thyself in
spring me with what Thou Glledst me
to deliver out of those verbs. But by
no other inspiration but Thine, do l be-
lieve myself to speak truth, seeing Thou
art the truth, and every man a lar"
He gives us the solution, at any rate, of
the ~obscurities of many writings, ORR
GEN and Saint GREGORY held that the
Gospels were not to be taken in their
literal sense and ATHASAsIUs admon-
ishes US, that, "shOuld we understand
sacred writ according to the letter, We
should fall into the most enormous
blasphemsie." Saint PAUL says
that " the letter killeth." EUsEBIUs
said, 'Those who preside over the Holy
Scriptures, philosophize over them, and
expound their literal sense bg sllegory.'
The Essences believed in the exoterie
and esoIric meanings of the scriptures.
So also did the Kabalists. ARIsToBU-
LUIS, one of the chiefs Of the Jewish
6reek School of Alexandria, declared
that all the facts and details of the jew
ish scriptures were so many a%llegories,
eoncealing the most profound meanings,
and that PLATO had borrowed from them
all their finest ideas. PHO, who lived
a century after him, following the same
theory, ~endeavoured to show that the
Hebrew writings, by their system of al
legories, were the true source of all
religious and philosophical doctrines.
According to him, the literal meaning is
for the vulgar alone. Whoever, he says,
has meditated on philosophy, purified
himself by virtue, and raised himself, by
contemplation, to God and the world in
the Divine Intellect, and received
their inspiration, pierces the gross en-
velope of the letter, discovers a wholly
different order of things, and is initiated
into mysteries, of which the elementary
or literal construction offers but an inn
nerfeet image. A historical fact, a fig
ure, a word, a letter, a number a rite, a
custom, the parable or vision of a
prophet, wells the most profound truths;
and he who has the key of science will
all according to the light he
possesses.
RIVER
WEATHER AND BUSINESS.
Westher fine. Business dull. The
river is still declining, at the rate of one
and a half inches per day. The upper
rivers are also falling.