selves more inclined than ever to rebel against the power which was imposing such restraints upon them. The way in which they discovered their disaffection, we cannot determine more definitely, than by supposing that it was in some act of open resistance to the laws of the Roman government. At length these tumults became so frequent, and brought the Jews, already hated on other accounts, into such odium with the emperor, that he banished them from Rome. This expulsion, which had perhaps other political grounds besides the one alleged, affected the Jewish Christians also, who had not yet begun to be distinguished from the Jews. For the same reason, it may be presumed that the Gentile believers did not suffer from this decree of banishment. The Christians in Rome were at this time few in number, and in general unknown as distinct from the heathen and Jews; so that they could not have appeared to the government as an independent community, and as such have excited its attention and jealousy. But whatever may have been the extent of the exile in question, the effects of it were eminently favorable to the prosperity of the Roman church. Those whom it drove from the city came back in the beginning of the reign of Nero, with every hope of security from the mildness which he at first displayed, and with means of usefulness greatly enlarged by the increase of knowledge and improvement of character, which they had attained in their absence. Many of them had been during this period intimately connected with the apostle Paul; and from him, as well as from the discipline of their trials, must have acquired no ordinary fitness for entering with boldness and efficiency upon the course of Christian effort to which they were called at Rome. Their situation, too, surrounded as they were by the idolatry and corruption of the Romans, must have tended still farther to arouse their sympathy and animate their zeal. But these efforts, to which they were thus excited, gave rise to new and imminent danger of collision with their heathen masters. The more tyrannical and cruel the Roman emperors showed themselves to be, the more cause had the Christians to fear that they themselves might become the objects of their violence; and hence they must have apprehended more opposition to their efforts from this source than from any other. To such fear many of them

added, also, the remembrance of persecution and loss of property which they had recently suffered. It was not, therefore, without special reason that Paul exhorted the Roman Christians to lead a quiet life, and to honor the civil authorities and powers, as ordained of God, to which they should submit, not only from fear, but as a matter of conscience. (Rom. 13: 1-7.) This was the course of policy, as well as of duty. It was by such obedience and submission, by an exact fulfilment of their duties to the heathen government under which they lived, that they could best allay its jealousy, and secure its confidence. It was in this way, too, that they would cause themselves to be more certainly distinguished from the turbulent Jews, who were every day becoming more suspected by the heathen, and with whom, therefore, it was so much the more dangerous to be confounded.

The position which the members of the Roman church occupied in reference to each other, is very clearly seen from the strain of the apostle's letter to them. It would appear that their differences pertained not so much to points of doctrine, as of discipline and practice. In the former respect their agreement of views was far greater than that of the Corinthian Christians. Certain ascetic errors had sprung up among them, and they had become divided respecting the lawfulness of certain things, in themselves indifferent. In chapters 14 and 15: 1-4, he speaks of those who, from the strictness of their ascetic notions, would not eat certain kinds of food, especially meat, on particular days, and goes on to show how Christians should treat each other in such a case, so as not to violate the love which should bind them together. Those who entertained these scruples, derived them, no doubt, from the principles and practices of the Essenes, and perhaps also of the Pythagoreans, with whom they had been connected before their conversion to Christianity. The followers of both these sects had spread far and wide, and must have been numerous at Rome also, whither every form of religion so readily found its way. It was not to be expected that such, on becoming Christians, would entirely discard the prejudices to which they had been so strongly attached. They came into the church still imbued with them; and thus brought with them the seeds of variance and alienation. Supposing that they

were not permitted to eat meat at all, or only on certain days, and showing a disposition to make their conscience in this matter a rule of duty for others, they offended those who did not feel themselves to be thus bound, and incurred their censure as weak and superstitious. These latter, again, in asserting their liberty, were in danger of going so far as to encroach upon the rights of the others, and to demand of them concessions which they could not honestly admit. From this difference, insignificant as it may seem in many respects to have been, violent divisions and parties might easily have sprung up, as was the case at Corinth; but it appears that things had not such an issue at Rome. In the first place, the points in dispute were altogether less essential than those which agitated the Corinthian church. In the next place, the party which advocated the ascetic principle was destitute of an influential representative or head; while, without doubt, those who had been the friends and disciples of the apostle Paul exerted their authority to harmonize the conflicting elements of the church. While they maintained strongly the cause of Christian liberty, they could not have failed, on the other hand, to promote a spirit of forbearance towards their brethren, whose scruples did not permit them to use the same freedom. The instructions and admonitions, also, which the apostle gave them in his letter, must have produced a decided and happy effect. Upon the whole, therefore, the state of the Roman church, after the return of those who had been banished, would seem to have been peculiarly auspicious. No other church could boast a greater number of members and teachers, who had been personally intimate with the apostle Paul, and had enjoyed the benefits of his society and instruction. And this circumstance we may confidently pronounce a principal cause of the rapid and sure progress which the gospel here made.

He

From what has now been said, we can readily see what occasion the apostle had to write to the Roman Christians, and also what object he proposed to accomplish. himself, in his Epistle to them, has assigned in general the reasons which influenced him. He has been called to be the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, and this has led him to write to the believers at Rome, that he may thus be the means of promoting their faith also.

He

expresses in his letter, again and again, his desire to spread the gospel in person at Rome; which, as being the capital of the world, and presenting the prospect of a rich spiritual harvest, very naturally excited such a desire in the mind of the apostle of the Gentiles. He had often already purposed to direct his course thither; but had always been hindered in his design. Through the Christians who had returned to Rome, after having been connected with the apostle by various and intimate ties, he must have felt himself brought into a close relation to the church itself; and, through the medium of the same friends, he could manifestly have acquired all needful information respecting its situation and wants. Under such circumstances, it appears entirely natural that the apostle, since he could not visit Rome personally, should have felt himself impelled to address the Christians there by letter; and in this way instruct them more fully concerning the plan of redemption by Christ, and the purpose of God to impart its benefits, without distinction, to Jews and Gentiles. But as he stood in no immediate personal relation to the church, he took his position rather upon general ground, and touched less upon special local circumstances than, for example, in the Epistles to the Corinthians and Galatians. It is not till towards the close of the letter, and in a sort of supplement to it, that he comes to those local matters which had been made known to him by his friends at Rome. Hence the occasion of this Epistle is to be sought more in the apostolic commission of Paul in general, than in any special personal relations which he sustained to the church; although these also, as has been shown, must not be left wholly out of view.

The object which the author proposed may be easily seen from the Epistle itself. Paul endeavored to convince the Jewish as well as Gentile believers, that they were both in error, if they had any disposition to depend upon any thing else for justification than faith in Jesus Christ. "That the gospel is the power of God to save Jews and Gentiles," is the proper theme of his Epistle. Hence it was not merely his object to oppose Judaism, and the assumptions of the Jewish Christians against their Gentile brethren, but he wished also to take away from the latter all pretence for superiority and boasting. Both were

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to enjoy precisely the same rights and hopes, since both were to be reconciled to God by one method, that is, faith in Christ. In this way all ground for dissensions between the two parties would be removed, and both would be united into one harmonious church of Christ. Hence, also, the course of argument which he has adopted. He labors to attain his end far more by exhibiting the universal necessity and perfection of the Christian plan of salvation, in contrast with the insufficiency and imperfection of the religion of both Jews and heathen, than by discussing and refuting the particular errors into which they had fallen.

ARTICLE III.

ON THE INDUCTIVE SYSTEM OF PHILOSOPHY.

A Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy. By Sir J. F. W. HERSCHEL. London. (Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopædia.)

IN seeking any end, the first and most necessary step is, to learn the right and nearest road to it. The next is, to learn the best mode of following that road. An end may be sought blindly, and in the dark, with no true notion, either of the right road to it, or of the best manner of following that road. In such case, the end may be reached, it is true, but it will be only by chance; it will not be as the well earned meed of a labor rightly directed. Hence Bacon justly remarks, that the knowledge gained of facts before the inductive system was established "was owing to chance and experience, and not to true science.' But the road itself may be seen, and in some degree known, and yet the guiding light through it be wanting, without which many blunders will be likely to be committed in following that road. Before the time of Bacon, the true road to knowledge was unknown. His Novum Organum

*Nov. Organum Scient., Lib. I, § 8. The edition here quoted is of Lugd. Bat., 1645.