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May 4, 1850.] . Uttf * 3Lt&i!tt* * 133
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DEATH OF JESUS. Newport, Isle of Wijf ut...
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MR. SANDARS ON PRICES. Sir,—Since I last...
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Conservatives are the True Repudiators. ...
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Critics are not -clae legislators, but t...
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Carlyle's Stump Orator will probably exa...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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The Gorham Case. May 1,1850. Sib,—Mr. Be...
¦ will manfully remain at his post , to expostulate and protest , whilst the Tractarian curate with ten children and £ 100 a year , will abandon the corrupted Church with virtuous indignation . The logic of the Bishop in the letter before us is as lame and halting as his consistency . He distinctly assumes that a convocation lawfully assembled ¦ would be the proper interpreter of the mind of the Church ; but he goes on to say that if this
convocation " should , by a solemn decision , reject the doctrine of baptismal regeneration , it will then be time to think of quitting the Church ' s pale . " In other words , as soon as the highest authority in the Church has declared the sense of a disputed doctrine her faithful children are justified in deserting her , supposing her decision to be adverse to their private opinions ! They , in short , who are now clamouring for the revival of the Convocation declare beforehand that they are prepared to dispute its decisions .
" I hold , " writes the Bishop , " that until the Church ' s articles and formularies are altered by the authority of Convocation , or of some synod equivalent to Convocation , her character as a teacher of truth remains unchanged . " " A question , " he adds , «« only be altered by ; a synodical decree . " This , then , we may conclude is sufficient ; but no , " even then , " says the Bishop , ' judges may differ in their interpretation of the decree , " and different courts may give conflicting decisions as to the meaning of the oracles of the Church . Where , then , in the
name of common sense are we to find the authoritative teaching of the Church if she rejects a legal and grammatical explanation of her own language ? Is it not clear that all this is mere " juggling with words '' to escape from the toils of a logical dilemma ? Is it not quite evident that there can be but two possible grounds for authority in matters of faiththe light within us—or the infallible traditions of the Church . But it is really impossible to grapple with a disputant who appears at one moment in the character of a Protestant Bishop , and the next is masquerading in the red stockings of a Cardinal . Becketts
They who now sit in the seats of the a' , the Wolsej's , and the Lauds of former days , are no longer the representatives of principles but of parties , and their highest ambition is to preserve the peace of the Church at the expense of her consistency . It will not be forgotten that the Bishop of London , on the first outbreak of the Tractarian heresy in his diocese , at fi'st encouraged and afterwards proscribed it ; and on being appealed to , to cTecide whether candles should be allowed on the altar , solemnly decreed that the candles might continue but that they must not be lighted ! I am , sir , your obedient servant , FllED . J . FuXTOX .
May 4, 1850.] . Uttf * 3lt&I!Tt* * 133
May 4 , 1850 . ] . Uttf * 3 Lt & i ! tt * * 133
Death Of Jesus. Newport, Isle Of Wijf Ut...
DEATH OF JESUS . Newport , Isle of Wijf ut , April 2 . ") , 1850 . Siu , —In a review of a book entitled The Destiny of Man , appearing in your paper of the 20 th of April , there is a quotation from the work , in which it is attempted to prove that the recorded death of Christ on the cross was a delusion . The author quotes St . John as an authority in support of his assertion , but he quotes him with substantial incorrectness . Thus , he makes St . John testify to having seen the blood which flowed from the Redeemer ' s
side when pierced by the Roman soldiers , in running down " mix with the perspiration which pain had produced . " Now take the words of St . John , 19 c , v . 34 , " But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side , and forthwith came thereout blood and v > ater . " The misstatement of the author as here indicated is important to his argument , as I will endeavour to show hereafter ; but he substantially
misquotes this statement of an eye-toitness whose veracity cannot be questioned , such statement having immediate and satisfactory reference to the cause of Christ ' s death , physically considered . The author adds , ' This confirms the conclusion that he was not dead , but had swooned . " Now , on the author ' s opinion of the physical effect of crucifixion , I have nothing to reply . Prima facie , therefore , it did not occasion death . But the ?• confirmation" of his conclusion" on this
head , and for which he refers to St . John , as above stated , has a physical reference of course . Now the blood that " flowed from the wound made in the sufferer ' s side by the Roman soldier ' s spear" did not necessarily imply that life was not extinct : when death is caused by violence alone the blood of a healthy person , in such case , will flow for a considerable period after death ; '' perspiration" also is occasioned by the last struggle with death , for causes well known to medical men . The appearances of
blood and " perspiration" ( to take the author ' s version of St . John ' s testimony ) do not therefore ' confirm the conclusion that" Christ " was not dead , but had swooned . " But , does the author mean to contend that there was no adequate cause of death occasioned by the spear of the Roman soldier ? St . John ' s words , above quoted , possess the strongest physical proof on this head . The remark of an e'minent writer hereon is highly important , if not conclusive . He writes— " For the flowing of the water out of that wound in the side was an indication of
And the moral one I trust is equally clear from the character of the witness , and the evidence he gives . * With these few remarks I will leave the author to enjoy his opinion , that Christ only " swooned" after saying " It is finished , " and " bowing his head . " I will leave other and better heads than mine to argue on matters of faith , prophecy , coincidence , and analogy ; on the occasion being superior to all physical laws , and on a mass of other powerful considerations ; contented with the assurance that the important point remains unrefuted , that Christ died on the Cross . Your faithful servant , A Subscriber .
the spear having penetrated the pericardium , in which the water was lodged , and on the wounding of which every animal dies immediately ** " This fact , therefore , was recorded to obviate the calumnies of the enemies of truth , who otherwise might pretend that Jesus was taken down from the cross before He was dead , and thence call in question the reality of his resurrection from the dead . " That Christ died , therefore , is the only physical induction to be derived from the piercing the side , and the concurrent appearance of " blood and water . "
Death Of Jesus. Newport, Isle Of Wijf Ut...
• Our correspondent should have added that we also objected on moral grounds to the opinion hazarded by the author reviewed ; at present the letter reads as if we had accepted the position . — £ d .
Mr. Sandars On Prices. Sir,—Since I Last...
MR . SANDARS ON PRICES . Sir , —Since I last addressed you , I have conversed with two gentlemen who for some years occupied farms of upwards of 300 acres in the neighbourhood of New York—and had previously farmed largely before leaving England , and who are , consequently , capable of estimating the relative expenditure on arable land in the two countries . Their general conclusions are , that it did not require a greater outlay in the wages of labour in cultivating arable land in America , than what is expended per acre by many individuals in this country .
The usual practice is to hire able-bodied men for eight months of the year , at the wages of ten or twelve dollars a-month , and to board them ; their hours of labour are from sunrise to sunset ; and being well-fed , the quantity of work they perform is great . Ten to twelve dollars a-month is equal to about 10 s . to 12 s . a-week , and allowing 5 s . a-week for board , it gives the wages as 15 s . to 17 s . a-week . But take off the four months of non-employment in the winter , it reduces the yearly average rate of wages to 11 s . 3 d . and 12 s . 9 d . per week ; and , making due allowance for the extra hours of employment , it will be seen that the cost of American labour exceeds but little the wages paid in many counties to the English ploughman . My informants have returned to England some years ago , and they tell me the wages of labour have within the last two years fallen very considerably , and I have seen it stated as 25 per cent . With regard to the two errors you mention in my calculations , probably the tradesmen ' s bills in America may approximate nearer to those of this country than I estimated ; but the amount of capital required to enter upon an arable farm in America is not more than one half of that required in this country . With respect to the inability of the English farmer to compete with the foreigner from the high rate of wages in this country , and the compulsory employment of the agricultural labourer , it is evident the question of wages alone would not disable the British farmer from growing , corn as cheap as the American . But there are many other important elements besides labour that greatly influence the productive cost of corn in the two countries . America is not the country that would be the great competitor of the British agriculturists , as wheat can be grown 50 per cent , cheaper in the northern states of Europe than it can in the Atlantic states of America . If we remove the disputed labour question from America to Poland we should then find the high rate of wages in England to be an important feature in the question of competition . S . S .
Conservatives Are The True Repudiators. ...
Conservatives are the True Repudiators . —It cannot be reasonably doubted that those who pertinaciously refuse to economize now , when we might thereby pay twenty shillings in the pound within a moderate number of years , and who insist on acting the Fatalist , and leaving all difficulties to the chances of the futuresuch persons ( though they generally call themselves Conservatives ) are promoting an ultimate repudiation of the debt . —F . W . Newman on the National Debt . Qqom Works for Sunday . —Dr . Charming throws out an excellent hint about working on Sunday in one
of his lectures ; we would recommend it to the earnest consideration of all Christians who wish to promote vital religion—whose faith is shown , not in angry dogmatizing , but in active working . " The Sunday which has come down to us from our fathers seems to us exceedingly defective . The clergy have naturally taken it very much into their own hands , and we apprehend that as yet they have not discovered all the means of making it a blessing to mankind . ? * * Would not the business of our public charities be done more effectually on the Lord ' s-day than on any other , and would not such an appropriation of a part of this time accord peculiarly with the spirit of Christianity ?"
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Critics Are Not -Clae Legislators, But T...
Critics are not -clae legislators , but the judges and police of literature . They do not make laws—they interpret ana try to enforce them . —Edinburgh Review .
Carlyle's Stump Orator Will Probably Exa...
Carlyle ' s Stump Orator will probably exasperate a greater number of readers than any of his previous pamphlets . It is a blow on the face of the thousands who mount upon platforms , whether of commons , meetings , lecture-rooms , or ^ printingoffices ; the thousands gifted , or believing themselves gifted , with the talent of Speech , and called upon by that talent to enlighten the universe . Nor will the red spot on their cheeks r emaining after the blow be wholly the blush of pain ; it will also be somewhat the blush of shame : for the stinging
truth of what Carlyle says—enveloped as it is in his usual exaggerations—must be felt by all . No one can accept it as an absolute expression of the truth ; but that his diatribe receives momentum from a real and weighty truth is beyond all question . It has given momentum to many a sarcasm from Auguste Comtb , who , as a scientific thinker , has an inveterate scorn for the false estimation in which Rhetoric is held—the supremacy , in these days , of Expression over Thought ; but who , at the same time , is too profoundly conscious
of the anarchy of our age , and of the causes of this anarchy , not to see that such a supremacy is inevitable , resulting , in fact , from the very absence of scientific convictions which constitutes anarchy . It is not in astronomy , in chemistry , in biology , that Expression and the talent of Speech has any supremacy ; it is not even in Political Economy so far as that science confines itself within its proper limits . The reason is simple . There a mass of ascertained truth , a system of irrefragable evidence speaks with a force
which no rhetoric can diminish . All the oratory in the world will not discover a truth ; it can only brighten it to the understanding . But in morals and in politics we have no science ; each man pilots his own boat on those terrible seas ; and pretty pilotage they make of it sometimes ! Carlyle regards with despair the growing tendency of Talk ; and thinks , with justice , that as long as we continue to estimate and reward the talent of Speech as at present , we are only adding to the confusion and peril of the times . His remedy is Silence ; a talent
for Silence he sets against this rabid desire for Talk . Here his instinct is right , his logic wrong . Silent work and silent thought are doubtless indispensable to man ; but unless we . receive truths by intuition , unless the solution of mighty social problems come to us unassisted , woven out of the entangled web of our own thoughts , we must speak that we may assist each other , that we may proclaim what truth we have seen or fancied . Carlyle admits that when a man has a thing to say lie must say it ; till then he should hold his tongue .
But does not every speaker believe he has something to say ? Who is to be the judge of the right thing to he said , and the right time for saying it ? His own conscience should be a stern monitor , bidding him not to mount upon platforms merely for the exhibition of his glib fluency , merely to make a speech for " cheers " and votes of thanks ; and as a suggestion to such a monitor , the Stump orator will be forcible , restraining , perhaps , many whose vanity is less than their sincerity . But if he really think he have any thing to say , we bid him speak it , we bid him speak openly , unflinchingly ,
whatever is in his mind , fearless of the ridicule which grins at " Utopias , " and the pity which smiles at " Dreams ; " because in the great work we have to do mutual assistance from each other ' s insight is indispensable . Until a Social Science be elaborated there must be anarchy of speech . Once secure a recognition of the positive laws which regulate Society , as you have secured a recognition of the positive laws which regulate the phenomena of matter and of life , you will then see Rhetors and Demagogues disappear , as you have seen in the history of Science how Astrologers and Charlatans have disappeared . Science has no platforms .
As we said a great truth lies underneath the vehement outburst of The Stump Orator j and people will feel it , when they have overcome their astonishment at its exaggerations . But if they accept the denunciations of this pamphlet literally they will pronounce the writer a mere juggler throwing about paradoxes . This pamphlet is the event of the week . The week has , however , given us another publication , which from the very nature of it cannot excite so much attention , but which
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 4, 1850, page 13, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_04051850/page/13/
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