EDITOR'S TABLE. 



409 



critical history of the Bible, which were 

 attended by crowds of eager listeners. 

 The lectures are collected in a volume 

 that at once becomes a text-book of 

 modern Biblical criticism. The true 

 scientific ground is here openly and 

 broadly taken, and it is generally ad- 

 mitted that Professor Robertson Smith's 

 book represents authoritatively the 

 scope and objects and method of the 

 critical school which has been growing 

 during the last half-century. It has 

 thus at length become the benign office 

 of Science to bring its methods to the 

 responsible task of throwing a better 

 light on the origin, history, and true 

 character of the Christian oracles than 

 has been derived from uncritical tra- 

 dition. Nor does the critical attitude 

 taken bv Professor Smith at all com- 

 promise his Christian position. He is 

 no skeptic, trying to undermine the 

 Scriptures. He holds to their essential 

 truth, but recognizes tliat on earth and 

 in time, and among ignorant, selfish, and 

 prejudiced men, truth is liable to be ob- 

 scured. Professor Smith is in no sense 

 an enemy of the Bible, as the follow- 

 ing passage from his lectures sufficient- 

 ly attests. He says : 



The Bible is a book of experimental re- 

 ligion, in which, the converse of God with 

 his people is depicted in all its stages, up to 

 the full and abiding manifestation of saving 

 love in the person of Jesus Christ. God has 

 no message to the believing soul which the 

 Bible does not set forth, and set forth not in 

 bare formulas, but in hvtng and experimen- 

 tal form, by giving the actual history of the 

 need which the message supplies, and by 

 sho'tt'ing how the holy men of old received the 

 message, as a light to their own darkness, a 

 comfort and a stay to their own souls. 



But a majority of the Free Church 

 of Scotland think that this is insufficient, 

 and demand that he shall cease his crit- 

 ical studies. A large minority, how- 

 ever, see plainly that it is neither pos- 

 sible nor desirabls to arrest the great 

 inquiry that is now so far advanced and 

 so securely established. 



A CASE FOR THE AXTI-VIVISECTIOX- 

 ISTS. 



Of all the forms of hostility to sci- 

 ence indulged in by narrow-minded, 

 prejudiced people, the anti- vivisection 

 movement is unquestionably the most 

 ridiculous. A'ivisection is cutting the 

 living; surgery is, therefore, human 

 vivisection. The human person is lia- 

 ble to a thousand accidents and dis- 

 eases, which can only be relieved by 

 vivisection. The surgeon, with his cut- 

 ting instruments of innumerable shapes, 

 operates boldly upon the living system, 

 inflicting pain that pain may be relieved, 

 saving damaged organs,restoring health, 

 and prolonging life. There is, indeed, 

 no art practiced by man that is so 

 valuable and important as that of hu- 

 man vivisection and this, moreover, 

 everybody knows. 



But human vivisection, pursued for 

 its beneficent purpose, is a difficult and 

 dangerous practice. It requires the most 

 accurate and thorough knowledge of the 

 organization of the human body, and ex- 

 tensive experience in working npon it. 

 In its early stages, when little was known 

 of the living system, it was a dreadful-, 

 barbarism, a manipulation of torture, 

 and, in serious cases, more liable to in- 

 jure than to benefit. The province of 

 surgery has ever depended upon knowl- 

 edge and experience, and it has become 

 successful in proportion as knowledge 

 has increased and the opportunities of 

 practice have been enlarged. Modern 

 surgery has advanced with the most 

 rapid strides, and at every step has 

 made humanitv its debtor. And this, 

 also, everybody knows. 



Yet, from the beginning, men have 

 combined to hinder the development of 

 this art upon which so much of human 

 welfare depends. For thousands of 

 years the dissection of the dead human 

 body the only source of knowledge to 

 the surgeon was held a horrible thing 

 by the multitude, was denounced as 

 sacrilege by the Church, and was for- 

 bidden by the state. 



