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Life and Writings of Herder. 833
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VOLo IV. 3 N
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: Account Of Herder's Life And Writings.
some justice , that he was too much of a poet to make a good expositor * Herder was certainly-deficient in that sort of prudence whicb-fofbtcfe : the undisguisgcS , expression of sincere feeling . His most earnest wish at this aime was to receive a call to Gottingen i and yet in his ¦ * ¦ * Provincial Letters , " and in
his ' < jJE & tfltt & t Heeords , " he wrote holdl y against Micbaelis and Schlozer , ; both of wh ^ rf ^ i ip . igbt have greatly promoted nis views . In , the ; -, y $ & 9 S : 1773—75 he delivered a series of discourses on the life x > f Jesus b which produced a very great impression on his audience , so that the peasants . rPf a neighbouring village , incorporated with the chu ? ch at Buckebur g * . -uae ^| to come every time with their Bibles in their hands to verify the texts of the preachero Some of these discourses exhibit a sort of paraphrase on important passages in the life of our Lord—thus serving to explain his
history , and to illustrate its practical applications . Of this kind is the discourse on the Resurrection of Lazarus ; of which the following extract may be taken as a specimen :
" Lazarus , our friend , sleepeth ! In these words Jesus traced a beautiful inscription on the gTave of bis deceased friend . It was not from delicacy , but from a deep feeling of truth , that he did not mention the name of death , but spoke of it as a sleep—a soft and sure transition to a better life . And this should ever remain the sole idea and feeling of death in the language and in the thoughts of Christians . The natural sleep is given us as a type , as a daily impression , of death . As , in that natural sleep , the outward part of men undergoes a kind of death , while the vital flame still burns on within , and gathers fresh vigour in its strange and inexplicable retirement , till it returns to renew the limbs and to reanimate the whole external creation ,, and the joyotus morning smiles around us and within us ; so what we call death ,
Is but a longer , a more mysterious and more hidden Retirement off the vital principle , as preparatory to the renovation of our powers in another life . As without sleep we could not enjoy the coming light of the morrow ; so without death , without the quickening and transformation of our mortal remains ,, we cannot ; enjoy that brighter morning which succeeds the grave . Sleep and death are brothers—the gentlest and most beneficent necessities of natureseparating , as with the shades of night , one day from another . Thou sleepesf ,
brother of Jesus ! deep is thy slumber , narrow thy chamber , and lowly thy bed of dust . But already from afar , whilst as yet tliou nearest it not , the step of thine awakener approaches . The hour is come , and the voice of thy friend is heard without thy grave , ' Lazarus , come forth ! ray friend , awake ! the moraing is come , arid the hours of thy slumber are over and gone ! A lovelier morning dawns upon thee ! The sunshine of spring is on the hills , fairer than it shone upon thee yesterday ! Come forth , my friend ! Lazarus , awake' i" *
We may judge from these extracts , that Herder ' s style of preaching was altogether opposed to the dry and critical—that , on the contrary , it was oftemtimes in the highest degree sentimental and imaginative . We now find him deeply engaged in literary pursuits . Im 1774 , he wrote his celebrated wor"k , ct On the Philosophy of the History of the Human Race . ' Of this performance we propose to give a pnore detailed account in some future numbers of the Repository ; suffice it , dti the present occasion , to observe , that the subject was One of the deepest Interest to Herder . The love of mankind , a deep sympathy with htirnnnity in all its national and individual varieties , was the guiding impulse of his genius , the pervading spirit which animates his multifarious writings , ' aii < f
* Werke , Baud XXXIV , s . 323 , 324 .
Life And Writings Of Herder. 833
Life and Writings of Herder . 833
Volo Iv. 3 N
VOLo IV . 3 N
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1830, page 833, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/mrp_02121830/page/33/
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