is also the seat of the so-called word-deafness (sensorial aphasia), subject to which the patient hears the word distinctly, but does not know what it means. Then, too, there is the so-called mental blindness, which, according to Munk, consists in the loss of the so-called optical memory-tablets, due to a derangement of the occipital region of the brain, while the actual visual centre itself is rather to be sought in the cuneus and the first occipital convolution. Here I would remark simply that the investigations of Meynert, Weiss, Heidenheim, and Preyer, place the seat of the ego in the cerebral cortex, while sub-cortical cerebral regions appear to be the chief seats of unconscious psychic functions, whose products, under favorable conditions, may rise into (individual) consciousness. In normal individuals the seat of the ego appears to be in the left cerebral cortex.

As to the extent to which memory may perform or withhold its proper functions, I have had evidence in dreams, during which I have accepted passing phantasies as memories of real events. This abnormal mental condition is explicable only on the theory that a dull, inert memory is overmastered by a too lively phantasy-a sort of mental irradiation in fact. And precisely as on awaking from such a dream we are able to separate our phantasies from the memory of actual experiences, so in certain forms of lunacy the dominance of the ruling phantasy being overthrown by favorable circumstance, the nerve centres of memory resume their normal functions. And just as on the resumption of the normal functions of memory on awaking we forget the greater part of our dream phantasies, so it seems probable that the delusions of lunacy are hardly remembered after recovery, when memory resumes its normal functions.

The phenomena of the double ego is then explained simply by the assumption that one and the same ego is at one time exposed to the hallucinations of phantasy, and at another time to correct perceptions; and that as the one acquires dominance, the other ceases to influence.

The intimate psychological relations between the several conditions of the dream, the hysteric, the hypnotic, and the lunatic states affords ground for hope that the corresponding lunatic state may be cured by relatively insignificant means. Think only of the power of suggestion-a power which, although often exaggerated, is nevertheless much mightier than the inexperienced suppose, and warrants the expectation that delusion may be cured by the counter-illusion of hypnotic suggestion.

W

SLEEP AND DREAMS.

DR. MORITZ ALSBERG. Unsere Zeit, Leipzig, October.

HY do we sleep? What is the nature of sleep and dreams? These are questions which have excited the attention of philosophers in all ages-Aristotle at their head-without resulting in any satisfactory solution of the riddle involved in them. In recent years, investigations in the domain of physiology and psychology have thrown some light upon the subject of that condition of men and animals which we characterize as sleep; and scientific observation has, to some extent at least, cleared up the problem of dreams.

There is now no doubt that what we characterize as sleep is nothing more than a suspension of the activity of the higher nerve-centres; but until recently, considerable divergence of opinion has existed as to whether, and to what extent, the somnolent state was conditioned by the flow or cessation of flow of blood to the brain. The old physiologists, and among them the famous Albrecht von Haller, taught that during sleep the blood vessels were surcharged with blood, and that sleep was induced by their pressure on the brain, a view that has still advocates, and that appears to derive a measure of support from the facts that a full stomach or a state of intoxication induces sleep. Others, and among these the no less distin

guished Blumenbach, supported the exactly opposite opinion, viz., that sleep was induced by a cessation of the flow of blood to the brain, a view which was also supported by a number of facts, as, for instance, the fact that sleep is induced by loss of blood or artificial pressure upon the veins of the neck.

The part played by oxygen in human and animal bodies, has a still more important bearing on the phenomena of waking and sleeping. It is now generally known that all the activities of life are maintained by a process of slow combustion. Further, it follows of course that this combustion in the organs in activity, is attended by the formation of dross and waste substances, which if they were not got rid of in some way would accumulate in the system and create considerable disturbance. Recent investigation has determined that this waste substance, this by-product of physical and mental and emotional activity, plays a very important part in relation to the changes from wakefulness to weariness and sleep-they clog the machinery of the organism.

Johannes Ranke was the first to draw attention to the fact that muscular weariness is induced by the accumulation of substances generated by muscular contraction, and especially of lactic acid. If this " tiring substance is injected into a muscle, it deprives it of working capacity, which can only be restored by artificial washing or by giving the circulation time to perform the task. All the known conditions agree with this theory of Ranke who goes on to explain that the "tiring substance" in consequence of its innate affinity for oxygen draws it from the muscles, and thus prejudices their capacity for the performance of their active functions. There is, then, a chemical derangement of the condition of the muscles; a transitory poisoning; and some learned men have ascribed the process of respiration to the same cause. As regards this last point, Rosenthal was the first to draw attention to the fact that the succession of respiratory movements is regulated by the measure of oxygen and carbonic acid in the blood. When the blood is saturated with oxygen the activity of the nervous apparatus of breathing is temporarily contracted, but the tissues quickly take up the excess of oxygen, which they replace by carbonic acid, and the so altered blood stimulating the nervous ganglia which set the respiratory muscles in activity, induces fresh respiratory action.

But while Ranke's view found general acceptance among scientific thinkers, an entirely new light was thrown on the phenomena of weariness and sleep, by the discovery in the system, by A. Gautier, of the so-called leucomaine, an alkaloid which both in its chemical constitution and in other respects, bears a great resemblance to the products of decomposition of the bacteria. the ptomaines and poisonous alkaloids, According to Gautier and Errera, this substance by its chemical affinity for oxygen deoxydizes the nervous centres and thus brings about that condition of weariness which induces sleep. Further observation, moreover, points to the conclusion that this leucomaine has also a direct narcotic action on the brain, and that it induces sleep by a species of intoxication. According to Gautier it is the lecuomaine in the brain itself which contracts its working capacity, and renders a strong stimulant necessary to the maintenance of a condition of wakefulness. Our movements become slower, thought languishes until at length a moment is reached at which our dulled perceptions fail to stimulate the brain to action, and we sleep. As a rule the influence of the tiring substance on the brain is confined to those organs or cells in which it is present, and this explains the phenomena of partial sleep. Deep sleep, says Exner, is reached by imperceptible gradations from the waking stage. By watching the approach of sleep it will be found that the circle within which ideas range grows narrower and narrower. It may be concluded that certain groups of ideas remain awake after others are sunk in sleep. On the approach of death, which has been characterized as the twin sister of sleep, organ after organ ceases its activity in a prescribed order, that portion of

the brain which is the seat of the highest spiritual activities dying first, and that which is the seat of lower (automatic) mental activities following later. And it is precisely so in sleep, the organs of the highest mental activity are the first to succumb. In this fact we find the explanation of somnambulism which, as the celebrated physiologist Johannes Muller has explained, is partial sleep. If we consider the possibility, that certain of the higher nerve centres which have their activity suspended on the approach of sleep, gradually pass out of this state singly or in groups and renew their activity, there is little difficulty in understanding the diversity of dreams, their want of connectedness, and even the terrible nightmare whereby, in spite of all efforts we are unable to move a limb, and have the sensation of being paralyzed. The explanation of this latter condition is that the motor nerves are still asleep while some of the nerves of thought are awake and active. The reverse of this is the case in somnambulism. Here the higher mental organs are asleep while the motor nerves are awake and capable of being set into activity by automatic nerve centres.

It may be remarked as worth remembering that the generation of the waste substances herein mentioned is almost suspended during sleep.

WHENCE CAME THE PRESENT MAMMALS OF SCANDINAVIA?

THE

W. M. SCHÖYEN.

Folkebladet, Christiania, November 18.

HE oldest geological strata, because they are full of palms, show that Europe, thousands of years ago, must have had a tropical climate. In these palms sported apes and other tropical animals. But the tropical climate, with its peculiar animals and plants, came to an end. An age of temperate climate succeeded, and was itself followed by an ice-age and its peculiar fauna of icebears, seals, polar foxes, etc. Upon the ice-age followed still another age before we reach the times which we regard as those of our age. Where did the animals come from which in this age live in Scandinavia? Evidently from the neighboring countries. But when we look upon the map and examine the geographical conformation of Scandinavra, and see how it is surrounded by water excepting on the northeastern border, we cannot very well believe that the animals wandered all the way around the gulf of Bothnia to reach Scandinavia, particularly as they represent so many southern species, such as the hedgehog, the mole, the deer, the roe, etc. Most of the Scandinavian bats are of Southern origin, and cannot very well be supposed to have crossed the sea on the wing, though the distance is not very great. It does not seem more reasonable than that the other animals should have come over by swimming, or by crossing on the ice. Some may have crossed over on the ice. We know that the sound between Sealand and Sweden is sometimes frozen over, which would seem to make the theory possible; but it is confronted by an insurmountable obstacle in the fact that the hedgehog, the badger, and the bear sleep during the winter and do not start upon their migrations at the time when the sound is frozen.

But all these animals must have come from the south. There is, therefore, no other way open than to suppose that the countries north and south of the Baltic sea were connected in some way.

And our supposition is proved by geological facts. The distribution of land and sea was different in the prehistoric ages from what it is now. We find at high elevations above the sea layers of earth full of the shells of sea-snails and molluscs, showing that these layers of earth must have been raised out of the sea. On the other hand we find below the surface of the sea extensive tracts of boggy soil, showing that they must at some time have sunk, for boggy soil never forms upon the bottom of the sea. It is exclusively a fresh water product, originating from the rotting of mosses and other aquatic plants.

"Submarine" bogs are found in many places on the coasts of southern Sweden, Skaane. Direct investigations have proved that the country is still sinking, In 1841 Prof. S. Nilsson measured the distance from Falsterbro lighthouse to the seashore, and found it to be 129 yards. In 1846 it was only 109, and in 1847 102. In thirty-four years, 1813 to 1847, the distance from Falsterbro lighthouse to the seashore has been reduced 144 yards. Allowing sufficient length of time, the separation of Germany and Sweden by water can easily be accounted for. Before the sinking of the last connecting links, the animals of the north and south had free intercourse. After the sinking, they were separated, and gradually became accustomed to their new surroundings and climate.

When Scandinavia was connected with Germany, only southern Sweden, Skaane, could be accessible to and habitable for the animals which came from Germany. Skaane was then and must still be considered the northern termination of the, middle European lowland.

This explains why the remains of such animals as the urus the bison, the cave-bear, the wild boar, and the fossil reindeer are found only in Skaane's bogs. Thus far north these beasts, which lived in middle Europe, could come by means of the land connection, and no further. Could they have come further, we should be able to find their remains elsewhere besides in Skaane. But there is no evidence that the urus, or any of the other animals mentioned, ever lived in Norway or any other part of Sweden.

Besides these mammals, now long extinct, came also those which still form a part of the fauna of Scandinavia, the elk, the deer, the roe, the lynx, the fox, the bear, the badger, the marten, the otter, the hedgehog, the mole, the beaver, the rat, and the mouse. As the country in course of time rose out of the water, they spread themselves over it.

When the upheaval of the country in the north had progressed so far that the present connection with Finland and Russia was established, another migration from these countries took place and brought the glutton, the polar fox, the reindeer, and the hare.

The present Scandinavian mammals have come to us from two different places and at different times. The earliest is the Germanic," the later is the "Siberian." Some species have come from both directions. The reindeer, for instance. This animal, no doubt, once came from the south and is found in fossils remains in the Skaane bogs, but it also came from the northeast, though at a much later time. The same has been the case with the reindeer's enemy, the wolf.

It is a fact, that while many of the species which came from the south have become extinct, those that have come from the northeast still exist.

IN

THE EGGS AND EMBRYOS OF THE CROCODILE. Journal of the Royal Microscopical Society, London, October. ́N Madagascar, where the. Crocodilus niloticus is very common, Dr. A. Voeltzkow has made a study of the embryogeny of the species. The egg-laying lasts 'from the end of August to the end of September. The number of eggs in a nest varies from twenty to thirty. The nest is dug about two feet deep in the dry white sand; the basis of its walls are gouged out, and into the lateral excavations thus formed the eggs roll from the slightly raised centre of the nest floor. Externally the nest is not discernible, but the parent sleeps upon it. The eggs differ greatly in form; the shell is white, thick, and firm, either rough or smooth; the double shellmembrane is so firm that the egg keeps its form after the shell has been removed; the albumen is a jelly firm enough to be handled, and the vitelline membrane is also very strong. When newly laid the eggs are very sensitive, and are readily killed by damp or heat; the older eggs, however, are quite hardy.

When the young embryos are about to be hatched, they

utter very distinct notes. These calls the mother hears, even through two feet, of sand, and proceeds to dig open the nest. Even the natives are unaware of the manner in which the attention of the mother is called to her young. Before hatching the embryo turns, and in so doing partially tears the foetal membranes. With the tip of its snout turned to one end of the egg, the young animal bores through the shell with a double-pointed tooth comparable to that which young birds possess. This tooth appears very early-by the time the embryo is six weeks or two months old; and it may still be seen a fortnight after hatching. Through the small opening made by the tooth the embryonic fluid flows out, softening the adjacent parts, and the whole is widened into a cleft. The process of creeping out may take about two hours. The young animal seems large in comparison with the egg; one measuring twenty-eight centimeters in length came out of an egg eight centimeters long and five centimeters broad. The young crocodiles are very wild little animals and are led to the water by the mother. They utter sounds, especially when hungry, but the pitch of their call is not so high as it was within the egg. Of the development, which takes about three months, some account is promised; but the embryos are extraordinarily delicate and their investigation is proportionately difficult.

IF

RELIGIOUS.

WHO WILL BE THE NEXT POPE?
RAFFAELE DE CESARE.

Nuova Antologia, Rome, October 1.

F the advanced age of Leo XIII. may reasonably arouse fears that his place will be vacant before long, his physical conditions do not seem to justify such fears. Leo XIII. is in his eighty-second year, but he is well and active and his mental faculties are sound. With him the Papacy is accomplishing an evolution, the end of which cannot be foreseen and the ultimate consequences of which are unknown. Either for this reason or on account of the great age of the Pontiff, the press of Europe and America is much occupied just now with the future Conclave. The French press does not conceal its wish that the next Pope shall not be an Italian and not be chosen in Italy; or that, if an Italian be chosen in Italy, he will walk in the footsteps of Leo XIII., and declare himself hostile to the Triple Alliance, irreconcilable with Italy, a docile tool of the republic for the Republicans, a nourisher of the hope of restoration for the Monarchists, a prized ally in case of war.

Opposed to the French interests are those of the allied Powers and all the other Powers. The desire, common to all there, is that the Pope be chosen at Rome, under those conditions of liberty and security which marked the Conclave of Leo XIII., and that the choice may fall on a cardinal of moderate and concilatory views.

The stronger probabilities are in favor of the Conclave being held at Rome. Only, if the war which is expected comes before the Conclave, and Leo leaves Rome, and peace be not restored before he returns, the next Pope will certainly be chosen out of Italy. A Conclave in Rome means an Italian Pope. The hopothesis of a non-Italian Pope is admissible on the sole supposition that the Conclave be held out of Italy. If a nonItalian be chosen, who will he be?

When a new Pope is elected, the time will be ripe for a reform in the Courch; but the old Latin traditions are still tenacious of life, and an Italian Pope will travel the same road as his predecessors, mixing up ecclesiastical matters with European politics, and making enemies right and left among ardent politicians. What a difference in the United States! In that country the Roman Catholic Church is not bound by the fetters and the conventionalism which paralyze its action in Europe. In the United States, Catholicism takes a practical form; religion is used in the service of mankind, is the forerunner of all progress, the friend of all the discoveries of

human genius. There are none of those restrictions and hesitations which we are accustomed to in Europe, and especially in Italy. The bishops speak and act as seems right to them; their suggestions to Rome are more formal than real. They reserve to themselves a liberty of thought and action of which we have no idea. They convoke diocesan synods and episcopal councils to discuss the interests of their respective dioceses; they found universities; they create school and institutions; they are indefatigable in works for propagating the faith, and freely deplore that species of Byzantinism and immobility which is suffocating the Roman Catholic Church in Europe. Their sermons are different from ours; they do not utter lamentations and words of despair; they do not recommend as the remedy for all evils the rosary and nine days' devotion; they recognize in the forces and manifestations of our age, more or less openly reproved by their brothers in Europe, how much there is of what is good and great; they are full of good sense, practical and modern. If the Roman Catholic Church should be governed from Baltimore or from Chicago, things would go on very differently from the way they go now, but it would no longer be a Roman Church. For this reason the future Pontiff will not be an American.

In the Sydney Quarterly Review, published in New South Wales, appeared at the end of last year an article by Doctor Oswald Kaetinge, entitled "Who will be the next Pope?" The author, after saying that the progress of democracy favors the action of the Jesuits, an action which in the United States is potent and multiform-declares that the next Pope will be the candidate of the Jesuits. "He will be a man of experience, of proved administrative ability, conciliatory, but at the same time of inflexible determination." This man, according to Doctor Kaetinge, can be found only where the English language is spoken, and he is Cardinal Gibbons," whose election would be a triumph of democracy, since he is of democratic origin and with the people toto corde. He would be a Pope who more than any other would greatly increase St. Peter's pence. San Francisco alone has fifty Roman Catholic millionaires. Cardinal Gibbons, moreover, is a man o great capacity; of affable manners; endowed with all the best qualities of an American and an Irishman. He is a born ruler. All the qualities which the Jesuits would like in a Pope are combined in him."

To explain the apparent contradiction between democracy and the Jesuits, two terms which in Europe are considered the antipodes of each other, it will be sufficient to observe that the Jesuits of the United States are not the petty politicians of Italy, and that the propagation of the Roman Catholic faith at New York, at Baltimore, at Chicago, at St. Paul, at St. Louis, at New Orleans, at Cincinnati, at San Francisco, is due for the most part to them. The Company has Americanized itself, and in its colleges educates equally Roman Catholics and Protestants. The Roman Catholic Church of the United States is the church of the working classes, and has a dominion much broader and greater than the trivial temporal power -the social dominion. The Roman Catholic Irish element is nearly the absolute master of the mines of California and Nevada, and disposes of wealth and influence. The article of the Australian theologian is important as a symptom of the movement, going on in some parts, but which is unknown to, and not understood by, the politicians of the Vatican.

The time is not yet ripe, it seems to me, for an American Pope who speaks no language but English, and therefore I believe his election impossible. If, however, by a caprice of fortune, Gibbons becomes Pope and does not transfer the Holy See to Baltimore or Chicago, Rome would take its revenge by laughing at him. Doubtless, for stirring up the stagnant waters and preparing copious material for history, the election of an American Pope would be just the thing. Yet the Roman Catholic Church will continue to be Roman for a long time to come, subordinating its fertile liberty of action to the fixed idea of a temporal principality.

IT

SERIAL PREACHING,

PROFESSOR J. O. MURRAY, D.D.
Homiletic Review, New York, November.

T is nothing new in the way of preaching which this article proposes to discuss. In fact, it is a very ancient style. It came into vogue early in the history of the Christian Church, and has held an honored place in pulpit ministrations down to the present day. The homilies of eminent Church fathers, like St. Chrysostom and St. Augustine, are illustrations of it in its most primitive form. Later in the history of the pulpit we find sermons in courses, like Dr. Charnock's celebrated discourses on the Divine Attributes, and Dr. John Owen's on the Holy Spirit. Not a few systems of divinity have been preached in courses of sermons.

There are manifest dangers connected with continuous preaching on any subject. The preacher himself may make it a chapel of ease. It is in some respects easier to prepare a course of twenty sermons on some general theme than to write twenty on as many different topics. The trouble with most expository courses is just here. They are dry as the commentaries from which they have been largely taken. They can be gotten up very easily in these days of cheap and abundant "helps" to Scripture study. But easy preaching makes hard hearing. Expository preaching was never meant to be laborsaving machinery for the pulpit.

The danger of stereotyped methods easily besets the preacher who starts out on a course of sermons. He needs to study variety here more than anywhere else, and he is tempted to study it less.

Preachers who have" hobbies to ride should beware of riding them in courses of sermons. All honor to Dr. Cheever for his splendid courage and fidelity in a time when more than one New York pulpit was muzzled. But he could have rebuked all iniquity North and South without riding his "hobby" in courses of sermons till he rode his church to death.

The danger of wearying an audience by harping too long on one theme must not be overlooked. The itch for variety at the present time is no doubt excessive. It is an unhealthy symptom. Still it must be remembered that the pulpit is not a theological chair nor the sermon a scientific lecture. It is the office of serial preaching—one office at least—to train the people in careful hearing, in the love of thorough discussion, in desire for instruction rather than excited emotion. If the course of sermons is too long drawn out, if it becomes dry and technical, if it deals in hackneyed commonplaces, if it be illchosen as to time, the serial preaching will be voted a bore.

The advantages of such preaching are not far to seek. Whatever else a habit of sermonizing on a hundred and four different subjects fifty-two Sundays of the year may do for a congregation, it cannot give thorough instruction in certain great departments of inspired truth. It needs only a small admixture of serial preaching to insure very desirable results in the way of edification. This biblical term, so often employed, means building up the structure of Christian knowledge. It is a continuous process. It implies the orderly and consecutive unfolding of Christian doctrine or precept.

Is it not worth our while to emphasize a little more the need of instruction from the pulpit of to-day? If the pulpit lays aside or underrates this function of teaching the people knowledge, it will in the end lose its power. No brilliant applications of truth to life, as they are called, no entertaining, theatrical starts which fill crowded houses, can keep the pulpit on its old

foundations if these be dissevered from the thorough drill of the people in scriptural knowledge.

Can this peculiar office of the pulpit be remanded to any other agency? To the religious newspapers? Their make-up seems to demand the greatest possible number of topics in every issue. They can give information on a great many things. But they can be teachers in no sense that replaces the pulpit. Can this function of the pulpit be relegated to books? This is frequently said, and on the face of it seems plausible enough The multiplication of good books in every department of biblical knowledge is a fruitful element of good. Of this there can be no doubt. It may, however, be safely concluded that in every congregation it will be only the minority that read such books to any great extent. What proportion of any congregation has read Conybeare and Howson's "St. Paul," or Edersheim's "Life of Christ," or even Professor Drummond's Natural Law in the Spiritual World"? These all are specially fitted to waken popular and general interest. They have been very widely read, doubtless, taking the general public into view; but when it comes to particular congregations the percentage of readers will be found small, so small that it is seen at once that books cannot take the place of the pulpit in its function of teaching.

"

ISRAEL AND EGYPT.

The Lyceum, Dublin, October.

N reading the list of eminent men who attended the recent

ON reading of Orientalists, one cannot fail to be struck by

the absence of Catholic Orientalists. But it must not be conIcluded that such Catholic Savants do not exist. When we speak of Catholic Orientalists, we are reminded immediately of the work of one, too little known among us, who would have made himself famous in the learned world, had life been granted him for longer labors. We allude to the Abbé Ancessi. His researches were mainly concerned with the connection between the legislation and ritual of Israel and those of the Egyptians, with whom Israel was so long kept in contact.

Comparing the Mosaic ceremonies with those of the land of Mizraim, the Abbé was deeply convinced that a strong Egyptian influence permeated the ideas, customs, rites, and entire life of the Hebrew race, and that it had, moreover, left the most undoubted signs of its action upon the history and constitution of the people.

At an epoch to which chronology formerly referred the very origin of the human race, there flourished on the banks of the Nile a powerful nation, possessing immense cities, formidable armies, schools of learning, and all that constituted a civilization.

Such was the position and influence of Egypt at the time when the family of sheperds, the fathers of the Hebrew nation, were leading a wandering life in the valley of the Jordan and over the plains of Palestine.

This land belonged to the sons of Abraham by the promise of God. But as yet too few in number to dare attack the races of Amalik or Canaan, it was needful that for a time they should be withdrawn into a foreign land, where they might be initiated into the customs of civilized life, to be disciplined and strengthened, until God should hand over to them the land so repeatedly promised to their fathers. Here the pastoral tent had to be abandoned, and these sons of the desert found themselves making bricks, hewing stones, handling the chisel and mallet, tilling the ground, and, in spite of prejudice and repugnance, being initiated into the arts and industries of ancient Egypt.

When Moses arose four hundred years later, the people were ripe for a constitution, laws, a government, and a national cult, and leaving Egypt, they carried with them, not only the treasures of their masters, but their customs, their laws, and their civilization. Moses, too, the great law-giver, was practically an Egyptian; for educated at court he was learned and accomplished in all the wisdom of the country, and all the sacred rites of the priesthood. These recollections of a lifetime would not have left his memory when the frontier of Egypt lay behind him. Nor was it intended that he should

forget these things which, purified from the corrupted elements of Egyptian mythology, were to revive in the Jewish laws and worship. The Ephod and its jewels, the "Rational of Judgment," the Urim and Thummim, are all borrowed from Egypt. And as in Israel, so in Egypt, the chief priest alone was entitled to wear the Thummim.

66

With regard to the other ornaments of glory” worn by the high priest, we may mention the tiara which Moses calls the Menizophat. The Hebrews had, during their stay in Egypt, become familiar with the beautiful and costly ornaments adorning the head-dress of both gods and kings, and understood their symbolism which, though often capricious and farfetched, was consecrated by a long and reverend tradition. Among these symbols one of the most common is that of the serpent Uræus. In some symbolical way, the sense of which has as yet escaped antiquarian research, the Uræus in the system of Egyptian theocracy represented the one true God, the eternal King of the country of whom earthly monarchs were only the permanent incarnation.

No created being could represent or symbolize Jehovah. His name alone, He Who Is, was engraven on the golden plate which rose from the brow of the high priest, as if to overshadow him with God's majesty. This idea of God resting on the foreheads of their pontiff-kings was one also very familiar with the Egyptians, and has been expressed by them on the statues of their Pharaohs in a variety of ways. How often, for example, have we not seen the divine Horus forming with his wings a coronal on royal heads?

Under the Ephod Aaron wore the long tunic called in Hebrew mehil.

The exact counterpart of this toga is found in Egyptian pictures representing the Pharaohs.

There are many even very good men who firmly believe that the Semitic revelations originated a form of worship hitherto utterly unknown, and having no possible analogy with the tabernacle, the ark, the sacerdotal vestments found in the pagan cults of that very epoch, and it may shock them to learn that the very pattern of the priestly garments and the order of the sacred ceremonies were borrowed from Egypt. The fathers of the Church, while loyally admitting the relations existing between the Mosaic form of worship and the Egyptian ritual, did not allow their faith in the inspiration of Moses to suffer by it.

Had God systematically excluded the whole traditional side of the social and religious life of his people, he would thereby have cast them into an unknown world, in the midst of wholly novel rites and ceremonies; but by introducing into His Temple all that was richest in the rites and vestments of the Egyptians, all that was most solemn in their temples, most elevated in their symbolism, and most impressive in their ceremonial, He willed that the Jews should feel no regret, and experience no void in their worship of Him when in the midst of their worship they should call to mind what they had seen in Egypt.

CURRENT UNBELIEF.

THE REVEREND PRINCIPAL GRANT, D.D. Presbyterian College Journal, Montreal, November. HERE are so many phases of unbelief that few men are to subject any completeness. In this paper I propose to speak of unbelief in the Inspiration of Holy Scripture, and of false views of inspiration as the cause of the unbelief. The Church claims that there is an element in the Old and New Testament writings that can be found in no other literature, and, therefore, declares them inspired. But the Church never has defined, in any of its great Creeds or Confessions, the nature and extent of Inspiration, either positively or negatively. It is notorious. however, that fools rush in where angels fear to tread. When the Church has been silent the priests, the pulpiteer, the dogmatist, and the schoolman have been accustomed to speak frequently, loudly, volubly. They have usually enunciated views of Inspiration similar to that claimed by the Mohammedans for their Koran, or by orthodox Hindus for their Vedas and Puranas. God dictated His revelations word for word to human mediums while they were in a state of ecstacy. This conception of Inspiration, which is still the favorite in many quar

ters of Christendom as well as Heathendom, is generally called high. It is not even low. It destroys Inspiration, and its consequences have been, and are, far more disastrous than will ever be known.

In accordance with this erroneous conception, Inspiration has been made to cover every subject referred to in the Bible, such as geography, geology, astronomy, history, antiquities, as well as the revelation of the character of God, and the character and destiny of man. No mistakes could be acknowledged. When scientific discoveries threatened old interpretations, the men of science and their disciples were held up to public ridicule and punished as severely as the public opinion of the age permitted.

Look at some of the consequences that have flowed from this false conception of Inspiration. The Scripture writers. believe with the world of their time that the earth was a great plain, and when men discovered that the earth was round, they were punished as heretics for teaching contrary to divine truth. Then came the discovery that the earth revolved around the sun. Again contrary to Scripture, and heretical. But in spite of persecution, the evidence on this head became so strong as to be irresistible. The discovery was then made that the Bible was never meant to teach astronomy, and great was the comfort to poor men who had been periling their souls on the contrary belief. Alas! that the discovery was not made sooner, or that the simple deduction was not then made, that the Bible was not intended to teach any branch of science. For soon another alarm was raised, and this time Geology threatened to discredit Scripture. What subterfuges where not then resorted to to get rid of the evidences of the antiquity of the earth.

One might suppose that by this time the lesson might have been learned, that the Divine element in the Bible does not extend to the knowledge of science, but that on such matters the writers occupied precisely the same platform as other men of their class and time. But to-day there is almost as much apprehension in some circles with reference to the conclusions of Historical Criticism, as there was half or a quarter of a century ago over the truths of geology. And so the average youth puts the matter to himself somewhat as follows: "On the one hand every eminent oriental scholar and unbiased investigator, who is at all in sympathy with the undoubted principles of modern criticism-with perhaps a single exception here and there, which only proves the rule-declares, that Deuteronomy was not written by Moses, but by a prophet in the reign of King Josiah, and that the Book of Daniel was not written in the sixth, but in the second century B.C. On such matters I accept the decision of experts as final. But on the other hand ministers and elders assure me that the Books then are forgeries, and as that is a point on which they ought to be competent to speak, I accept their decision."

These men still go to church, perhaps, from habit, or it may be under the impulse of the devotional instinct, until their sense of decency is outraged by the sneers of the preacher at a subject he is ignorant of, or his denunciation by name of scientists whose works he has never read.

But what, it may be asked, would you have the minister do? Must he not be faithful to his convictions? If he is to do any good, must he not preach a definite theology? Did not Jesus of Nazareth speak with authority to learned and unlearned? To all which questions I answer, emphatically, Yes. Faithful the witness for God must be, or he is not a Minister of the True Witness. Definite truth he must preach, or else he should never enter the pulpit. He is not called on to take sides on disputed questions, and he should do so least of all when he does not understand both sides. As a public teacher he is bound to master a subject before he attempts to teach it to grown men. When he believes that the spiritual convictions of his people are bound up with prejudices, preconceptions, and traditions, he must be patient lest in pulling up tares he pull up the wheat also. Reflecting on how slowly new truth dawned on his own mind, how at first it seemed to threaten the very foundations of the old edifice in which he and his pious father and mother lived long in peace, enjoying the light of God's own countenance, he will be careful not to pull down until he has built up, and on no account to shock the sensibilities or blunt the reverential feelings without which religion cannot exist. But, while nourishing the babes, he must not repel the strong young men. There are very few intelligent men who do not know something of the conclusions of the Higher Criticism, and who are not in sympathy with the movement as a whole. To fight against it, is to fight a hopeless battle.