village chapels, which he supplied on week evenings; and in one year he preached 364 sermons. We believe it is the intention of the reverend gentleman to furnish the world with the proofs of this surprising fecundity, by publishing the discourses; but if he takes good advice, he will keep the MSS. for his children, or devote them as a burnt-offering. We can make every allowance for the necessities of his position, but cannot believe that he ever thought out his subjects. A youth of seventeen may do marvels, but as a paper-mill cannot produce paper, without it is abundantly supplied with materials, so a youth cannot create new discourses at such a rate. He who produces largely, must read largely, and digest thoroughly; and where was the time for this when he was but seventeen, and had to preach every day? We remember reading of the great Robert Hall, that when put forward as a youth to address congregations he succeeded to their satisfaction, and excited their wonder; so that we doubt not had he pursued the same course he would have been lauded as much as Mr. Spurgeon has been, or even more, because his intellectual powers were infinitely superior. Fortunately, however, for his fame and usefulness, Robert Hall resolved to devote some years to study, in order to learn what the past could teach, before he began to teach others. He declared his belief in that saying of Baxter's, "Nor should men turn preachers "as the river Nile breeds frogs (saith Herodotus), when one-half moveth before "the other is made, and while it is yet but plain mud."* If some kind friend had thus advised Mr. Spurgeon, we believe that with the speaking power he possesses, and the knowledge which study would have given him, he would have become one of the greatest amongst orators. As it is, we foresee a decline, but we must not in this paper anticipate our future conclusions.

It will be obvious to our readers that commencing so young it was not possible the preacher could do more than repeat at second hand the teaching of others. Unless, indeed, it be assumed that he was directly inspired.' This is what Mr. Spurgeon would lead us all to believe. On one occasion in his sermon, "Preach the Gospel," he informed his congregation that once while preaching in "Scotland, the spirit of God was pleased to desert me; I could "not speak as I usually have done, I was obliged to tell the people that the "chariot wheels were taken off, and that the chariot dragged very heavily along." He goes on to inform them that his failure was not through lack of study, and adds, "I think that I am bound to give myself unto reading, "and not tempt the Spirit by unthought-of effusions. Usually, I deem it a duty to seek a sermon of my Master, and implore him to impress it on my "mind; but on that occasion, I think I had even prepared more carefully "than I ordinarily do, so that unpreparedness was not the reason. And in another part of the same sermon, where speaking of what he then felt, he said, "I felt as if I should speak no more in the name of the Lord; and then "the thought came, 'Oh! thou art an ungrateful creature; hath not God 'spoken by thee hundreds of times? And this once when he would not do so, "wilt thou upbraid him for it?" This indicates clearly enough that Mr. Spurgeon is supplied from Heaven with his sermons, but we confess to some measure of scepticism upon that point, and simply because many of them are marvellously like those of Owen, and others of the old Puritan divines, and we doubt if Heaven would send the copy of an old discourse.

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The fame of the youthful preacher, as a second Timothy was soon spread through the Baptist Churches, and considering the then poverty-stricken state of their pulpits, it was only natural that his suceess should be made a matter * Saint's Rest, pref. to part 11., orig. edit. New Park Street Pulpit, No. 34.

for rejoicing. His fame soon reached London, where there was a great dearth of "Baptist talent," and as New Park-street Chapel needed a pastor, it was resolved that he should be heard by some of the great critics of that denomination. The preachers heard and arrived at the conclusion that "Impudence" was at the bottom of the discourse; but a great commerical man, who also heard, decided otherwise. He declared that it was "Talent-wonderful talent," and added, "great spiritual talent, sir. He shall have New Park"street Chapel; he shall be well advertised and draw the town." Such is the current story in relation to Mr. Spurgeon's introduction to London; and although it may require here and there some addition in order to its standing as the whole truth, there is no reason to doubt either that he has been well advertised, or that he has drawn the town.

In January, 1854, he first came to New Park-street chapel, the pulpit of which had been occupied by Dr. Gill, of polemic fame, and by Dr. Rippon, for one hundred and sixteen years between them. The Chapel was soon filled, and Exeter Hall (taken for sixteen Sundays during the enlargement) was always crowded, whatever the weather might be, and in the evening, at twenty minutes before time, the doors were generally locked, with a placard put upon them, The hall is quite full; no more room." The crowd in the Strand before opening the doors reached across the road, and entirely obstructed the thoroughfare, until the police were compelled to keep a lane between the people on either side of the road, to allow omnibuses, &c., to pass. When he returned to Park-street chapel it was crammed to suffocation-many hundreds who went never arrived near the doors. The doors were shut till ten minutes before service time, and the police were employed to see that none but seatholders entered at the side entrance. Of course this was felt to be exceedingly inconvenient, and the New Park-street people were alive to the fact that "the "finger of Providence pointed back to Exeter Hall," and back they went. Again the hall was crowded to suffocation every evening, and many persons believed that at length the time had arrived when "the Gospel" thus preached would be accepted by all. Now there was to be a revival, "a glorious revival and outpouring of the Spirit," which, however, was not believed by any but "the elect." The more thoughtful looked on with suspicion, some even with contempt; but still the crowds came, until at length it was resolved that the great Concert Hall in the Surrey Gardens should be engaged, and there the young preacher has exercised his talent ever since. The only interruption was the melancholy one in Octoter, 1856, when so many were killed in the Hall through the wild cry raised by some unduly frightened listeners. Mr. Spurgeon now treats that catastrophe as one of "the designs of the evil one" to check him in his career, but he believes also that through the accident he has been made the means of saving many more souls than otherwise would have fallen to his "share. We shall show him, when we are discussing what he teaches, that in this, according to his own doctrine, he labours in error But we cannot quit the subject without observing that had the accident oecurred in any other place, or even in that, save when used by an orthodox congregation, the Christian Church would have treated it as a pouring out of God's wrath upon sinners," as it was, it was only an accident, not brought about by supernatural power at all, unless indeed it was "through the Devil."

This "marvellous success" so widely advertised and notified, has operated upon all the churches in Great Britain, and has brought their leaders up to town to hear the orator for themselves. Judging from what we have heard, there has been a great deal of "bitter disappointment," and the homeward

reports were not so favourable. The "churches" could not all come, and hence it is that Mahomet has gone to the mountain-the preacher has visited many of the churches. In various parts of England he has preached to many thousands of expectant hearers, who have journied miles to hear him; and surely no man of modern times has had fairer opportunities of doing good. That good, however, has not been accomplished, and we are satisfied that until he changes his whole system of doctrine, it will be impossible for him to effect anything in the way of religious progress. He may frighten delicate ladies into fits, but that does not indicate great success. In Scotland, to which he was pressingly invited as a country wherein his Calvanistic doctrines are generally received, he was listened to with considerable surprise, and his preaching has not tended to increase Scottish respect for English criticism, The Scotch are a logical, cool-headed people, and although they like to have the doctrines of "particular election and final perseverance preached," although they believe that some were made to be saved to the glory of God's grace, and some were made to be damned to the praise of His justice," they like to hear the matter treated "cannily." The flippancy of Mr. Spurgeon when discoursing upon such points was particularly painful to them, and rather tended to shake their belief in the doctrines themselves, than to create any great respect for the preacher. We were informed by a Scotch Clergyman-an AntiCalvinist that he wished Mr. Spurgeon would preach in every city and village in Scotland, "for," said he, "the perfectly free and easy way in which he treats "of the damnation of millions would disgust the people with the doctrines they have been trained to believe." It is a fact that many men believe doctrines which they would repudiate, were they placed nakedly before them, and that Mr. Spurgeon does this with Calvinism is known to all who have heard or read his discourses. In England their comparative novelty, combined with the fact that few of our people really understand them, secures a sort of wondering attention and nothing more.

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But although we have had to record what are viewed as proofs, that Mr. Spurgeon has succeeded, still, in every practical sense, we doubt the success. Spurgeon hats and Spurgeon bonnets; Spurgeon dances with the gentlemen in one room, and the ladies in another; Spurgeon libraries and text books; Spurgeon pocket handkerchiefs and neckties: Spurgeon bazaars and almanacks, with the whole range of Spurgeonised articles and books, are no proofs that in any noble sense Mr. Spurgeon has succeeded; Whitfield, Wilberforce, and Cobden succeeded in their work, and yet we had no such baptisms. These noisy and showy successes are superficial only, not deep. They do not reach the heart. How, indeed, comes it that the preacher and his people have been so long collecting money to build the New Tabernacle? Only £20,000 required, and of that but one-half is yet subscribed. Surely had there been any real success, the pockets of the people would have yielded better proof of the softening influence he had operated upon their hearts. We believe that if the " glorious Tabernacle" is not built very soon, Mr. Spurgeon will not have a large congregation to take into it. But why we believe this will be shown in other articles; next week we shall record our own impressions of the preacher, after which we shall invite attention to the profanity and immorality of thought and teaching we have discovered in the printed discourses. And if in discussing his teachings we should at times speak harshly, we are satisfied that all who read to the end, will feel that it was a duty in us so to do. Our only aim will be to place the whole matter faithfully and clearly before our readers, so that each and all shall judge for themselves. P. W. P.

SOUTH PLACE CHAPEL SUNDAY EVENING LECTURES BY P. W. PERFITT, PH. D.

ABRAHAM AND THE NATURE OF HIS FAITH.

If it be true, as frequently alleged, that we are called upon to build the tombs of the prophets and great men of the past, it is equally true that we are called upon to pull down and destroy many monuments which were raised to the honour and glory of those to whom neither glory nor honour were due. If the really noble have been neglected, it has only been as a consequence of, and has run side by side with the fact, that the ignoble and the unworthy have been unduly exalted. Read our history, and then wander through the National Pantheon; you will discover cause enough to look with sorrow upon the busts, the statues, and the monuments there erected, and you will not fail to think many bitter thoughts about the fate of those who are excluded. Our old Abbey contains, both of the living and the dead, far more of the unworthy than of the worthy. There are memorial signs enough, but of all the tombs, statues, and monumental records, how many are visited in love, or gazed upon with either heartfelt admiration or warm enthusiasm? Our greatest men are not there; some who were buried there were afterwards cast out, and now the ground is cumbered with those whose lives yielded no fruitage. And it is precisely the same in our common histories. What well-read student now believes Cranmer to have been either a good man or a noble martyr, as is set forth in our common books, misnamed, of history? Who that has ventured into the study of our political and social annals believes that Laud was a generous, wise, and worthy prelate, that Charles was a resolute lover of truth and justice, or that William Pitt was the greatest of statesmen? And yet in our ordinary histories these things are set forth as though they were unquestioned truths. Then, in the same works, the majority of men now known by all students as amongst our greatest and noblest, are treated as though it were true that unworthier or ignobler men never existed. In truth, it is a sad story, and we can only plead that we are not alone in this matter. England has not to stand forth from among the nations with crimsoned cheek to confess this shame as though it were peculiar to herself, for if a truth, it is shared by them all, and, in like manner, by the ancients. When we read "Niebuhr's History of Rome we discover the same facts; for while great men were amongst that Roman people, the majority of the nation seemed as though they were wholly blind to their worth, wisdom, and patriotism, and went foolishly on, lavishing their choicest gifts upon men who were deficient alike in all noble aims, whose character had no noble traits; men who only exercised their authority in order to enrich their own families, and to hasten the decline and fall of the vast empire they were called upon govern. Neither can Greece be excluded from the list. Although we have been so long in the habit of speaking of her sons as if they were the perfection of patriot virtue, we find that when a man has read the recent critical histories, written by Thirlwall, Grote, and Mure, he awakens to a full consciousness of the fact, that within the said Grecian States there was as much of public injustice, of fraud, and sham heroism-mere parade, falsehood, and wealthworship, as in any other country or states. Socrates had to drink the cup of poison, while the unworthy were preserved alive, were exalted to their niche in history, were popularly believed to have shone in virtues, to which their whole lives were positive strangers, and to have despised vices which, in truth, they daily practised.

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And what good cause from nature or reason can be assigned for our adoption of the belief that the Hebrew people were so far exalted above others, that they escaped this common error, or were not subject to the weakness? Why should we suppose, either that they preserved records of all who were worthy, or that all they registered as noble really were so? I confess my inability to discover, either in nature or in their history, any such reason; while, upon the contrary, facts abound, which prove to demonstration, that they were as incapable of discriminating between the really great and the superficial, as any other ancient people. I do not find, after a close and candid examination of their history, that they were in any sense

more highly endowed-intellectually and morally—than other nations; and to declare that they always honoured the really great, that they received the good, and rejected only the evil, is as absurd as if we were to affirm that they made no mistakes in science, and were always correct in their historical notices of surrounding nations. Their history is a living protest against that idea. For to go no farther back than the history of Christ, does not the Church ground its teaching upon the idea that "through the Jews rejecting him, the Gospel was preached to the Gentiles?" an idea, which duly considered, should induce the Christian community, if they really believe it, to deal more leniently with the Jew. As a people we know well enough that they frequently missed true greatnesswere too dull-eyed to perceive it when it was amongst them, and went forth cagerly enough to see a mere reed shaken by the wind. The great they expected to come with a mighty noise, with the sound of trumpets, the beating of drums, and shrill piping. When a prince was born, then would they rejoice; for, as they asked of one another, "hath not God given us a mighty one in the person of our prince?" Through life they looked to this prince for great deeds, although, in truth, all their princes had disappointed them; they believed that as a stem of the royal tree, he would perform magnificent actions, and that from him they would obtain lofty wisdom. But all this while the truly great, born in some stable or other, was wholly overlooked, and when years had passed away, and the truth was shewn forth, then foregone conclusions were too powerful to allow it to prevail. And exactly so in their mythology and traditional history. They were equally liable with other nations to take upon trust the characters of men. Call a man good, and they would repeat the saying, without ever going into the evidence, or comparing his actions with the known moral laws. We say not that they were an exception in this; it is easier to praise or condemn a man, than to sift the evidence so as to discover whether praise or censure be his due, and the Hebrew people were as fond of ease as any others. Still, in justice to them, it must be acknowledged that copies of their historical books, as well real as legendary, were rare, so that they could not enter into any critical discussions with the same ease permitted unto ourselves, and, hence, for their habit of taking character upon trust they deserve a pardon which cannot be extended unto ourselves. We have the documents, and, hence, can easily ascertain if the character given us be, or be not, in accordance with the recognised facts. There is scarcely a man amongst us who cannot arrive at sound conclusions for himself in relation to this subject; but, unfortunately, we do not employ the means at our disposal, in order that we may discover the truth. There is no book so little read in England as the Bible. We readily grant that it is " gone over" probably more, far more frequently than any other, but not read. I recently had a conversation with a gentleman who professed that through the past twenty years he had been in the habit of reading to his family and servants some portion of the Old or New Testament, and he declared himself to be well acquainted with its contents. I did not deny, but admitted his claim, and said that being so well versed in its contents, he would doubtless be able to answer me a few questions; but when I had proposed them, I discovered that he knew far more of "Burn's Justice of the Peace" than of the Bible. He had "gone over" the latter, but the former he had “read,” in order to discover its meaning. One was studiously read, the other only mechanically. I mentioned several matters connected with the Bible characters, and he declared that I "must be mistaken-there was no such statement as that I had asserted;" but when I turned to all of them, then came the painful admission that he had wholly overlooked them, he "had never looked at the facts in that light," and thus, in truth, was practically unacquainted with the book whose contents he supposed himself to know better than any other. I mention his case, not as an exceptional one, but as illustrating a large class, and, as I believe, the majority of its so-called readers. They read it much the same as a school-boy reads his lessons. Here and there we meet a fine grey-headed old man or woman who read a few passages from the Psalms, Isaiah, Job, or some portion of the Gospels with real feeling-they can see in what they read exactly that which they want for comfort and consolation. It