CRITICAL NOTICES OP NEW PUBLICATIONS. 299 



veyed, arise from the mode of expression. The difficult, secret and happy 

 effect of style consists in adapting the expression to the exact sentiment or 

 sense intended to be understood. Herein centres the highest merit in speak- 

 ing or writing — ' to describe humble things with delicacy ; great things with 

 gravity; and such things as are alike removed from both, with equability and 

 ease.' The Holy Scriptures are a wide and fertile field, in which all this 

 variety may be found ; and where else are they treated so strictly and so 

 beautifully, in obedience to this rule? If the minutise of the Jewish law 

 solicit our attention, they are related in a familiar way, and yet without the 

 least approach to coarseness : but, if the subject be lofty, with what thrilling 

 solemnity is its diction clothed : and, if a plain history of facts demands our 

 attention, perspicuity of statement and artless eloquence invest the narra- 

 tion with an identity which no embellishment can command: vividly and 

 graphically it comes before our view. The Scripture diction, moreover, is 

 graced and diversified with remarkable peculiarities of style. If we select 

 the great Apostle of the Gentiles ; in his epistles, are united the concise anil 

 the beautiful: they are distinguished by a condensed and energetic expression, 

 by a short but most impressive turn of sentence, wherein there is no dryness, 

 or wearj'ing sameness. St. Paul's style of writing is every way worthy of 

 the greatness and diversity of his subject. At times, he seems to combine 

 the separate excellencies of all the other sacred writers— the majesty of 

 Isaiah, the devotion of David, the pathos of Jeremiah, the vehemence of Eze- 

 kiel, the sublimity of St. John, the noble energy of St. Peter. Unambitious 

 of ornament, his style is as varied as his discursions. He is, by turns, vehe- 

 ment and tender, didactive and impassioned : now, pursuing his argument 

 with logical precision, and then disdaining the rules of which he was so com- 

 plete a master — thus making his noble neglect more impressive and convuic- 

 ing than the most elaborate elocution. In his diction, the mass of thought, 

 the mournful yet touching examples, the deep feeling, the holy melody of 

 the language, breathe the very loftiness and fortitude they would inspire. 

 Nothing can be more illustrative, and yet apposite, than his allusions 

 and metaphors : he enforces on the Hebrews the doctrine of salvation 

 through Christ, by a reference to the rites, ceremonies and economy of the 

 Jewish dispensation. To the inhabitants of Achaia, how apt and beautiful 

 is his illustration and how impressive is his moral when alluding to the ab- 

 stinence required by competitors in the Isthmian games, he gives it a spirit- 

 ual comment by insisting on the subjugation of unruly passions in the 

 Christian combatant. The close of his analogy is eminently apposite and 

 new, when he compares the value and duration of the frail and fading gar- 

 land worn by the victorious Greek, with the incorruptible crown of the Chris- 

 tian conqueror. There is scarcely a beauty in style or expression with 

 which Scripture diction is not enriched. With the most precise and logical 

 brevity, it sometimes appeals to the judgment ; again, it rises in dignit}^, 

 and arrayed with all the gorgeous plenitude of imagery, it wins the fancy. 

 While, in its didactic j)recepts, it stoops to the humblest mind, it delights 

 and rewards the most cultivated taste, not merely of a Christian taught and 

 schooled to admire and magnify what it loves and prizes, but the taste even 

 of a pagan — and yet more, the taste of an infidel. Even the unbelieving 

 Rousseau confesses that Socrates, the beloved idol of his insane devotion, 

 fades into insignificance and nothingness, before the awful dignity, the 

 matchless purity, the love, the charity, the humility, the holiness, the god- 

 head of Jesus Christ. The fine imagination of this gifted writer was fixed 

 with the Sublime of Christianity. And herein are exemplified its power and 

 attractiveness; here is the influence of the Scripture style, arranged with 

 all the grandeur of truth, the magnificence of reality. There is nothing so 

 likely to win the heart as the disclosure of stupendous veracities ; it needs, 

 it employs no embellishment. Coarseness or w^ant of taste has no afiinity 

 with piety : there is a severity, a solemnity, more subduing than wordy elo- 

 quence." 



VOL. VII., NO. XXII. QQ 



