Public Education as affected by the Minutes of the Committee of Privy Council from 1846 to 1852; with Suggestions as to future Policy. By Sir James VIII. - Politique de la Restauration en 1822 et 1823. Par M. le Comte de Marcellus, Ancien Ministre Pléni- potentiaire. Paris: 1853, . IX. 1. An Act for granting Duties or Profits arising from Property, Professions, Trades, and Offices. 5 & 6 Vict. c. 35. Passed the 22nd June, 1842. 2. A Treatise on the Principles and Practical Influence of Taxation and the Funding System. By J. R. McCulloch, Esq. 2nd edition: 1842. 3. Principles of Political Economy. By John Stuart 4. Remarks on some Popular Objections to the present Income Tax. By John Macpherson Macleod. 1849. 5. Property and Income Tax. Schedule A. and Schedule D. By J. G. Maitland, M.A., F.R.S. 2nd 6. First Report from the Select Committee on the Income and Property Tax. Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed 17th May, 1852. 7. Second Report from the Select Committee on the 420 461 511 THE EDINBURGH REVIEW, JANUARY, 1853. No. CXCVII. ART. I.1. Hippolytus and his Age; or, the Doctrine and Practice of the Church of Rome under Commodus and Alexander Severus: and Ancient and Modern Christianity and Divinity compared. By CHRISTIAN CHARLES JOSIAS BUNSEN, D.C.L. In 4 vols. 12mo. London: 1852. THESE HESE volumes cannot fail to attract much attention from the public. The importance, interest, and variety of the subjects which their title-pages indicate, and the high character, reputation, and position of the author, will conspire to invite alike the inspection of those who amuse themselves with looking into the current literature of the day, and the attentive perusal of the careful inquirer into the history and antiquities of the Christian Church. Some will be desirous of knowing what a statesman and a diplomatist of more than thirty years' standing can have to say on the Comparison of • Ancient and Modern Christianity and Divinity;' others will be curious to see how a foreigner, the distinguished representative of the Sovereign of a great German kingdom, shall have acquitted himself in the difficult task of writing a work of such extent in the English language. Both those who hold to the High Church party and those who belong to the Low Church party will be inquisitive to learn what so zealous and influential a member of the Evangelical Church of Germany, who for nearly twenty years was the King of Prussia's minister and plenipotentiary at Rome, and has subsequently held the same responsible office for more than twelve in London, has to VOL. XCVII. NO. CXCVII. B say on the subject of the Doctrine and Practice of the Church of Rome under Commodus and Alexander Severus;' while the serious and earnest inquirer after the truth will be anxious to learn what new light one who has already gained so much reputation by his historical and critical works can throw upon our hitherto obscure information respecting so early a writer as Hippolytus, and what additional knowledge he can give us touching so important a period of the history of the Church as the age in which he lived. It does not fall within the scope which we have proposed to ourselves, nor would it be suited to the limited space of our pages, to attempt to offer an opinion upon all these questions. We must refer each of our readers to the volumes themselves to satisfy his own curiosity as to that peculiar view of the subject which may best accord with his own taste or feelings. We will content ourselves with pointing out some of the leading facts and opinions in the book which have struck us as being chiefly deserving of attention, and as much as possible we will allow the author to speak in his own words, which will afford the least chance of misapprehension. In the earlier part of the last year there appeared a work published under the auspices of the Delegates of the Clarendon Press, at Oxford, bearing the title Origenis Philosophumena E Codice Parisino nunc 'sive Omnium Hæresium Refutatio. 'primum edidit Emmanuel Miller.' The manuscript from which the editor transcribed and prepared this work for the press, was one of those which had been acquired for the French nation, in 1842, by Mynoides Mynas, who had been sent out at the expense of the government by M. Villemain, at that time Minister of Public Instruction, with the laudable object of searching among the monasteries of Greece for such inedited classical, or other interesting works as he could obtain; for the purpose of depositing them in the National Library, where they would be secure from the danger of being destroyed, and likewise be made accessible to the critic and scholar. This mission was attended with considerable success other works which he acquired was a transcript of the long lost fables of the elegant writer Babrius†; a manuscript of among * See 'Rapport addressé à M. le Ministre de l'Instruction Publique 'par M. Mynoide Minas, chargé d'une mission en Orient,'in the 'Revue de Bibliographie Analytique.' An. 1844, vol. v. p. 80. † The MS. of Babrius was found with several others in the convent of St. Laura, at Mount Athos, under a board covered with dung. The monks refused to sell it, or at least asked so high a price that Mynas made a transcript of it, from which M. Boissonade pub account: the Dialectica of Galen, and the Gymnastica of Philostratus. The well known reputation of these classical writers very naturally directed to them at once the full attention of some inquiring scholars: they were immediately examined, and the result forthwith made known to the public. Among the rest of the manuscripts thus obtained, was one unpretending volume, of which Mr. E. Miller, in 1844, gave only the following brief - Manuscrit en papier de coton, du xive siècle, con' tenant une réfutation de toutes les héresies. Cet ouvrage d'un 'auteur anonyme est divisé en dix livres; mais les trois pre'miers manquent ainsi que la fin.'* Subsequently he was led to bestow more attention upon this volume; and finding it to be an authentic work of much interest and importance by a Christian writer of not later date than the first quarter of the third century; having also ascertained that it undoubtedly comprised the latter books of the same treatise as that of which the first book had been already published, with the title of Φιλοσοφούμενα, οι Κατὰ πασῶν αἱρεσεων ἔλεγχοs, in the editions of Origen, he came to the conclusion that he had then in his hands a considerable part of a very important work by that most learned and philosophical among all the early writers of the Christian Church. It was natural that he should feel the desire of communicating to the public his discovery of a work of such interest and value for the early history of Christianity. His proposal to the Delegates of the Clarendon Press to undertake the charge of the publication was met by that liberality on their part which they have been so often ready to show upon similar occasions. We are fully convinced with Mr. Bunsen, and with the author of an article in the Ecclesiastic,' that the work is not the production of Origen; but we cannot think with this latter writer that the Delegates, in supplying the means of publishing it under that title, are either individually or collectively at all pledged to the editor's opinion, or in any way responsible for the arguments which he has advanced in his preface on that head. Mr. Miller's talents and capacity in the Greek language and literature were well known to that board, and had been favourably mentioned by Dr. Gaisford, in one of his valuable publications which, within the last few years, have issued from the Clarendon Press. They could therefore rest assured that a lished an edition at Paris, 1844. Several editions have appeared subsequently on the Continent, and one in England by Mr. Cornewall Lewis. * See 'Revue de Bibl. Analyt.' |