for the early culture and the subsequent studies of its ministry, and its people have ever found supreme delight in the discussion of knotty points in theology. Both have had their periods of religious revival and decline, and have come out of both with renewed energy of faith and power of love. But somehow or other it had happened that till within a few years past, say till the days of Thomas Chalmers and of John Brown, the current Scottish theology had come to be a stumbling block and an amazement to the most ultra Calvinistic and antiquated New England theologian. While both countries held and loved the same gospel and professed the same creed, and taught the same catechism, the theology of the preachers and laymen of the two, even before the rise of the so-called new and old school parties in New England, had become very strikingly diverse. This was true not only of the theology of the schools, but equally of the theology of the pulpit and of the pews. During the last fifty years, theology in both Scotland and New England has been subject to other changes, under manifold influences. But long before these changes, we find in New England, conspicuously from the times of Jonathan Edwards, that theology has been ruled by the aim which was avowed in his letter to Rev. John Erskine, "to bring the late great objections against Calvinistic divinity from these topics to the test of the strictest reasoning, and particularly that great objection . . . that the Calvinistic notions of God's moral government are contrary to the commonsense of mankind."-Life, by S. E. Dwight, pp. 497, 8.

As a maxim of theological inquiry, Edwards acknowledges the obligation to open anew all questions by a fresh investigation of the grounds of the same, from Reason and the Scriptures. Whatever Edwards may have intended he practiced after this method, and the many theologians who followed him, in assent or dissent, have applied substantially the same rule. The great questions which from time to time have been forced upon their attention have all been re-argued as though they had never been discussed before. They could not do otherwise without being untrue to the spirit in which their institutions in church and State had been founded and defended. Upon the simple truths as revealed in the Scriptures they had dared to stand against the fashion of the world in both Church and

State. The free air of the forest and the bracing breezes of the sea added fresh inspiration to the higher and holier confidence that they had been divinely guided to bless the world with a better gospel and a purer church than the world had yet witnessed. It is not surprising that when they confronted the great themes of theological truth, with a fresh yet reverent eye, they should think of them freely. The independence of each local church, and its pastor, the entire absence in the early times of rule or dictation on the part of superior courts, the unquestioning deference paid by each parish to its pastor, all contributed to the bold and reverent thinking which have been so characteristic of the New England theology.

It is to be observed also that though this theology has been proverbially and excessively speculative and metaphysical, it has also been as characteristically practical in its aims and its spirit. It has been largely controlled by the experiences and teachings of an earnest and devoted Christian life. Not only has it been a believing, but it has been an eminently spiritual theology, and from the first to the last it has brought its positions and conclusions to the one test: how they stand related to an exalted, a self-denying and an aggressive Christian life. Some of its characteristic defects may be traced to this influence, but these render its presence only the more conspicuous.

The New England theology and the New England way of approaching theology may of late have been modified by new influences. Perhaps it were more just to say, it may have been enlarged and liberalized by additional elements. But in the readiness with which it has taken these new elements into its life and acknowledged their truth and importance, it has shown the rareness of its docility to new truth from any quarter. In the single-heartedness with which it has welcomed new ideas it has shown a singular nobleness of mind. Whether it shall be superseded or modified in the future, it is safe to say that in the past it has introduced into theological thinking a method, and a freedom, which have been widely felt in this. and other countries, and without which theology might at this moment be far in the rear as compared with other sciences, if indeed it did not hang as a millstone upon the enlightened thinking of Christendom. Whatever New

England has accomplished for theology has been inspired by the original spirit that made the New England churches free of one another's control, and free of the manifold dictation and intermeddling of ecclesiastical tribunals and their managers, especially when these arrogate to themselves the special functions of defenders of the faith. It is the belief of not a few, who also believe in Christ and Christian truth, that theology is destined still further to improve and make progress. Indeed they cannot see how it should be otherwise. If theology as a science is to a large extent constituted of elements that are derived from philosophy on the one side and criticism. on the other, then as these sciences are perfected, theology itself must inevitably change, and change for the better. A system of church order which provides for such progress, while yet it is conservative of the great essentials which make theology Christian, deserves the gratitude of all who have been blessed by its light.

We are well aware that we shall be reminded of the Unitarian defection as a proof of the weakness of its polity to overcome or eject error. When we point to Jonathan Edwards and Timothy Dwight as examples of what New England has done for theology, we shall doubtless be pointed in turn to William E. Channing and Theodore Parker as examples of the perils to which it has brought Christian truth. To this we reply that the Unitarian movement was not confined to the New England churches. It was equally powerful and perhaps more dangerous among the Rationalists of Switzerland and Germany, the Moderates of Scotland, and the Arians and Socinians of the Anglican Church. Whether it were better that it should be concealed or outspoken, that it should be fostered as a party within a church or separated from it as a sect, it does not become us to argue. We know this, that the New England churches first reasoned against these errors, and then renounced them; whether wisely in all cases, or charitably, we do not care to affirm, but we think as effectively and with as little evil as churches of any other polity could have done under similar circumstances. What is better still, they have learned wisdom from those from whom they were compelled to dissent most widely, and have not been ashamed to state and defend their

interpretations of Christian truth and their conceptions of the Christian life in such a way as to leave less occasion in their opponents to object against them.

Great stress is laid upon the point that the Calvinism of the New England theology has been especially offensive, and brought out in conspicuous relief, the harsher features of the Genevan system. It were far more true to say of it that it has sought to reconcile these features with a corrected theory of man's nature, and a more logical statement of doctrines of God's purpose of redemption. Instead of resting on the philosophy of an earlier school, it insisted on opening schools of its own for each new generation, and did not hesitate to follow its new positions to their logical extremes. Even if these extremes now and then offended the conscience and better judgment, out of this stubborn faith in logic, and unshaken confidence in truth, there came by degrees conceptions of theology which were at once more rational in their claims upon the intellect, more acceptable to the conscience and the moral sensibilities and more in harmony with the redeeming mission of the merciful Saviour. Crude and harsh as some of the forms of New England Calvinism may have been in their day, in some of their aspects, yet when viewed as successive stages of development to a better system, they fulfill the riddle of Sampson, "Out of the eater came forth meat and out of the strong came forth sweetness."

We have no objections to concede that in the progress of these discussions, this theology was at times conspicuously paradoxical and frightfully metaphysical, so frightfully at times as almost to overlook the personal Christ as the object of love and faith in its zeal for some exact or acute statement of doctrine. But the earnestness of its search for truth and its willingness to follow the truth wherever it may lead are always conspicuous.

The characteristic features of the New England churches will only be imperfectly understood if we fail to interpret them by their conceptions of the Christian life, as to its nature, its beginning, and its manifestations. The able author of The Great Awakening has very pertinently said (p. ix), that "the most important practical idea which then received increased prominence and power was the idea of the "new birth." "This idea,"

he observes, "did not originate with this great revival, but it was held by the original settlers of New England." "They believed that when a man is "born again," a change is wrought in him, of which it is possible for him and others to find evidence, that the regenerate differ from the unregenerate by the possession of some substantial good qualities, which must show themselves in thought, feeling, and conduct; and they felt bound to treat all as unregenerate, in whom, on examination, no evidence of Christain piety could be found. They therefore admitted none to their communion, except such as might in charitable discretion be considered regenerate persons." (p. 31.)

The New England Congregationalists were distinguished from the other Reformed churches in this, that they admitted "none into the followship of their church but saints by calling," while all the others admitted to membership and the sacraments, all baptized persons whose lives were not scandalous. This is the explanation of most of those peculiar views of the Christian life, of their doctrine of a conscious conversion, of revivals of religion, of their high and yet discouraging standard of the inward experience and outward life, as also of their half-way covenant devices, and their fearful struggle to be rid of them. It. partially explains their views of church organization and church. government, with the good and evil which have come from both. First of all, the Christian life in their theory and expectations was reserved for persons who had reached the age of independent and conscious reflection, and was ready to assume the responsibilities of mature manhood. Though it was not denied that elect infants might be sanctified from birth, yet the evidences of the grace were allowed only in some rare examples of precocious reflection or of unnatural sentimentality. It was not believed to be within the ordinary methods of the divine economy, to bring young persons into the experiences of the Christian life. Indeed, the processes themselves were esteemed so intellectually discriminating, so emotional, so exalted, and so thorough in their effects as to be quite beyond the reach of any but mature minds. Except under the miraculous quickening of an extraordinary revival, no youth was thought to be practically capable of a genuine conversion nor in any case was it thought that the process itself could be perfected except