routine of topics and expressions, and is perpetually repeating himself, and becoming more and more uninteresting to his charge; while, at the same time, he is perhaps wondering at the diminution of his hearers, and attributing his want of success to any cause but one within himself. The assiduous study of the Bible, with direct reference to the services of the pulpit, is indispensably necessary, whatever species of preaching may be adopted.

We plead, at present, for no more than a discreet admixture of biblical exposition with the other methods of discourse. In entering upon such a course, it is not necessary that the minister should introduce his first experiments into the principal service of the Lord's day he might make trial of his gifts in less frequented meetings, or in some more familiar circle called together for this special purpose. And even where the expository method is exclusively adopted, as some may see cause to do, the pastor is to beware of that extreme which would always present very long passages. The expository plan, wisely conducted, may be said to include the other. Where, in due course, a verse, or even a part of a verse occurs, so important in its relations and so rich in matter as to claim a more extended elucidation, it should be taken singly, and be made the basis of a whole sermon, or even more.

As a model of familiar exposition we would cite the Lectures of Archbishop Leighton on the First Epistle of Peter. The great excellency of these is their heavenly unction, which led Dr. Doddridge to say that he never read a page of Leighton without experiencing an elevation of his religious feelings. "More faith and more grace," says Cecil," would make us better preachers, for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. Chrysostom's was the right method. Leighton's Lectures on Peter approach very near to this method."-"Our method of preaching," says the same writer," is not that by which Christianity was propagated: yet the genius of Christianity is not changed. There was nothing in the primitive method set or formal. The primitive bishop stood up, and read the gospel, or some other portion of Scripture, and pressed on the hearers with great earnestness and affection, a few plain and forcible truths, evidently resulting from that portion of the divine word: we take a text, and make an oration. Edification was then the object of both speaker and hearers; and while this continues to be the object, no better method can be found."*

Such a mode of preaching is less adapted than its opposite to make the speaker a separate object of regard, and might be selected by many on this very account. It is now some years since we enjoyed the privilege of listening to the late pious and eloquent Summerfield, the charm of whose brilliant and pathetic discourses will never be forgotten by those who heard them. After having, on a certain occasion, delivered a deeply impressive sermon on Isaiah vi., 1-6, he remarked to the writer of these pages, that, in

* Cecil's Works, vol. iii., p. 312.

consequence of having been pursued by multitudes of applauding hearers, he hd been lead to exercise himself more in the way of simple exposition, as that which most threw the preacher himself into the shade, and most illustriously displayed the pure truth of the Word.

The same idea was expressed by the late Dr. Mason, in circumstances which no doubt drew from him his sincerest convictions and most affectionate counsels. The words are found in a sermon preached in Murray Street Church, December 2, 1821, on the occasion of resigning the charge of his congregation; and we earnestly recommend to every reader this testimony of one who, it is well known, was eminently gifted in the very exercise which he applauds.

In suggesting to his late charge the principles upon which they should select a pastor, he says: "Do not choose a man who always preaches upon insulated texts. I care not how powerful or eloquent he may be in handling them. The effect of his power and eloquence will be, to banish a taste for the word of God, and to substitute the preacher in its place. You have been accustomed to hear that word preached to you in its connexion. Never permit that practice to drop. Foreign churches call it lecturing; and when done with discretion, I can assure you that, while it is of all exercises the most difficult for the preacher, it is, in the same proportion, the most profitable for you. It has this peculiar advantage, that in going through a book of Scripture, it spreads out before you all sorts of character, and all forms of opinion; and gives the preacher an opportunity of striking every kind of evil and of error, without subjecting himself to the invidious suspicion of aiming his discourses at individuals."*

With these remarks we may safely leave the subject, commending it to the careful and impartial investigations of all who are interested in the propagation of divine truth, and particularly to ministers of the gospel, who, of all men living, should be most solicitous to direct their powers in such channels as to produce the highest effect.

*Mason's Works, vol. i., p. 366.

ESSAY XX.

FÜRST'S HEBREW CONCORDANCE.*

THE appearance of great literary undertakings, whether deserving of the name from the novelty or importance of their subjects, or from the amount of patient labour or of original thought expended on their execution, may appropriately be compared to that of eminent individuals in the political world. For as these latter exert a powerful influence upon the character and conduct not only of the men among whom they live and move, but also of their posterity to distant times; so important literary achievements, while thousands of ordinary publications are suffered to sink into oblivion, remain as monuments of the intellectual prowess of the age in which they are produced, and serve as guides and helpers to future advances in knowledge, virtue, and happiness. Hence it is highly proper that their appearance and character be recorded in literary history for the benefit of posterity as well as of contemporaries, in like manner as those of celebrated men are preserved in the history of political events. These two histories unitedly compose that of mankind in general, considered both as acting and as reflecting beings.

The two principles of action and reflection, although inseparably combined in every individual of the human race, have each arrived in various nations and epochs at various degrees of development. The predominance of the former tendency displays itself in the performance of deeds of heroism, while that of the latter is exhibited in aspirations after literary distinction. This truth will be found strikingly exemplified on comparing the history of the middle ages with that of our own times.

The former of these two tendencies may be termed the objective, or that in which the united faculties of mind and body seek to manifest themselves in outward action; while to the latter we may give the name of subjective, or that in which the mental powers, having attained a high degree of development, are more

Originally published in 1839, in review of "Concordantiae Librorum Veteris Testamenti Sacrorum Hebraicae atque Chaldaicae, &c., &c." Auctore Julio Fürstio, Doct. Phil. Lipsiae. 1837-8. Sect. I.-VIII.

especially directed to abstract reasoning. Two opposite tendencies analogous to these may likewise be observed in the operations of the mind alone, which either restricts itself almost exclusively to a consideration of the objects presented to it by the world without, or, soon leaving these, proceeds to digest, to combine, and to work out new results of its own, independent of any further external influence. The former tendency is exhibited in the production of learned compilations, the latter in that of speculative and theoretical works.

As all ideas, including even the most abstract, are in the first place excited although not created by perceptions, and those chiefly of external objects, it follows that the objective development of the mind must necessarily be first in the order of time; and that only after the completion of such development can its subjective powers manifest themselves in any pre-eminent degree: or as Schiller beautifully expresses it,

Nur durch das Morgenthor des Schönen
Dringst du in der Erkenntniss Land;
An höhrem Glanz sich zu gewöhnen,
Uebt sich am Reize der Verstand.

If we desire to know the degree in which these opposite tendencies of the mind are developed in any nation or epoch, we have only to ascertain the character of its principal literary productions; and on this account, if no other, their appearance must attract the attention of those who desire to become acquainted with the history of the progress of the human mind. The work whose title is placed at the head of this article is one which we regard as presenting strong claims to consideration, on account of the extraordinary amount of mental labour both subjective and objective which its execution manifests as well as its important bearings on the advancement of biblical studies.

As this work comprises a Hebrew Lexicon as well as a Concordance to the Hebrew Bible, we will consider its claims in each of these respects separately, commencing with the former. The lexicography of Dr. Fürst does not consist in the mere introduction of improvements of greater or less consequence into the systems of his predecessors; but is founded on an original plan of his own, the result of new and most enlarged views of the philosophy of language. These views, by making higher claims on the philologist than have been heretofore preferred, give rise to such deep investigations and happy discoveries, that, although occasionally warned by a too great boldness of conjecture to be cautious in their application, we feel continually more and more inclined to adopt them in all their breadth and fulness.

On examining into the leading features of the new system of Hebrew lexicography as compared with those which have preceded it, and tracing the course pursued by this department of philological science, we obtain a full confirmation of the truth of

the axiom above laid down, that the chief tendency of the mind in its first operations is decidedly objective.

Lexicography, or that science which has for its object the elements of language, viz. words separately considered, was first applied to the Hebrew about a thousand years after it had ceased to be a living tongue. Up to that period it had been learned much in the same manner as that in which a child acquires its maternal idiom, namely, by obtaining a knowledge of a succession of phrases and entire sentences rather than of detached words. Now this synthetical mode of acquiring a language closely resembles the operations of nature in the formation of speech; for it should be remembered that the words which constitute the body of a language are created not singly and in succession, but simultaneously in the form of propositions. The same method of study is still in use among the Oriental and Polish Jews, who obtain a practical acquaintance with the entire contents of the Old Testament and even of the Talmud, without ever knowing that such a work as a lexicon exists, its place being supplied to them by living teachers, who, as it were, resuscitate the inanimate form of the language by again clothing it in living articulate sounds.

This mode of learning a dead language can be successfully pursued only when we enjoy the constant aid of a living instructor, who, by first explaining the meaning of the strange sounds through the medium of others which we have been accustomed to employ as the exponents of ideas, and by afterwards accustoming us through a long course of practice to associate our iceas with the new sounds and the signs representing them, may in time succeed in making the dead language bear to us the relation of a living one. Without such assistance the signs in which the spirit of the dead language lies embalmed must for ever remain to us a mystery, unless we can learn their signification by means of others with which we are familiar; or, in other words, unless we are furnished with books which, by explaining the etymological history and meaning of every word, in a language already known to us, may in some measure supply the place of viva voce instruction.

As regards the Hebrew, when we consider that the reverence in which the sacred records it contains have ever been held by the Jewish nation has caused the language to be preserved among them by tradition from generation to generation, and provision to be made for a constant succession of teachers who spend their lives in the study and explanation of the holy volume, we are less inclined to feel surprised at the fact that the attention of their learned men was not sooner directed to the investigation of single words, even when copies of the Scriptures, glosses and various readings of the text, and copious commentaries written for the elucidation of particular books existed in abundance, and were continually receiving fresh accessions to their number. And in fact it was only when, in consequence of multiplied oppressions and dispersions, the band of teachers became diminished, their schools shut up or destroyed,