a trustful anticipation of that good time which shall come at last to remedy the ills, and to redress the manifold inequalities of earth, which bears witness to the simple piety which lay at the bottom of his eccentricities.

So far well. But his system abounds with inconsistencies. How can it be otherwise when the mind presumes to be its own guide in the pursuit of truth? No one can travel far with a man like Swedenborg without becoming painfully aware that he must choose between his self-constituted teacher and the guidance of the Church as it has been in all ages. The same confusion of matter and spirit which clouds his philosophy reappears in his theology. The attempt to live a life superior to the animal nature recoils upon itself. In Swedenborg's imagination the spiritual world assumes a grotesquely material character. He imagined that he could see his evil passions exuding as vapours from his body, and taking the form of worms. He began by arguing that the invisible world may be deciphered from the analogy of things visible. He ended by saying, so far as a precise meaning can be attached to such vagueness of thought alike and expression, that the sun which we see in the sky is not merely a symbol of love and wisdom, but essential love and wisdom itself. Coleridge has said that nature, meaning material nature, is the antitheton of GOD. Swedenborg's teaching, if carried out consistently, ends in Pantheism.

Can we wonder if a system developed, in great measure, out of the consciousness of the individual, diverges more and more from the beaten track? Swedenborg's repugnance to dogmatic theology and his disregard of tradition, issue naturally, if not in an explicit denial of the great truths of Christianity, at least in the evasion or suppression of them. In his periphrastic language they are disguised and diluted, till they disappear altogether. It is easy to quote passages in which Swedenborg professes his faith in the SAVIOUR, but in denying His eternal Sonship he practically denies that He was GOD. Whatever may have been Swedenborg's position at first, he ends in promulgating a new Christianity which is to supersede the old. His bland and philanthropic sentiments, his fervid expressions of piety, must not hinder us from allowing this. The tenets of the Book of Mormon may be more directly inimical to the truth, but the standingpoint of the prophet of the Mormonites and of Swedenborg is in fact the same. It would be strange if the ultimate results were very different. A lax theology inevitably tends towards a licentious morality. Truth doctrinal and truth practical are sometimes spoken of by superficial cavillers as separate and even

The

antagonistic, but they are one. Swedenborg, like Joseph Smith, claimed to have a revelation from heaven, and an illumination far surpassing all previous revelations that ever were. prophets of old, he says, were inspired, but not as he was; theirs was only an unconscious reception of truth, while his is rational and intelligent. Forgetting that the internal senses of Scripture are manifold as the diverse aspects of truth, he insists that he alone has caught the internal sense, that his interpretation, and no other, is the right one. Forgetting that the future punishment of the wicked, like the future bliss of the faithful, is shrouded in mystery from mortal eye, and ear, and brain, he defines the state of departed spirits with a more than scholastic precision. He fixes a year for the end of the world, with all the audacity of Dr. Cumming, and with equal success. Those who oppose his notions are "persecuting the truth." Nay, he claims to be himself the representative of the SAVIOUR coming to judge the world! Certainly the career of Swedenborg is a warning to those, who, with intentions as good as his, set themselves to erect a Church of the future, as if the hoary edifice which CHRIST built on the rock were tottering to its fall.

But there are other lessons to be learnt from Swedenborgianism. Its history shows what is and must be the result of taking the Bible alone as the rule of faith. It is a practical refutation of the theory, which has lately been propounded with more than usual emphasis, that we have only to take the Bible in hand and interpret it like any other book. Those who begin with the Bible alone, are very apt to end with a Bible expurgated and mutilated to suit their own requirements. It will be a fatal day for education in England if ever the chaotic vagueness of what is called Bible-Christianity be substituted for creed and catechism. Above all, Swedenborg's preposterous assumptions ought to deter others from that self-confident habit of dogmatizing, which intrudes into regions "where angels fear to tread." In his wildest extravagancies Swedenborg always fell back, in default of other reasons, on the infallibility of the inspired text in its every word and letter, and of his own interpretation of it. Christians of a more sober and reverent frame of mind be content to know, that in Holy Scripture there is indeed the voice from heaven speaking to them, without presuming to define in what degree and manner the heavenly voice deigns to use the instrumentality of mortal speech, utterly inadequate though it be. The clear and definite teaching transmitted in the Church from CHRIST and His Twelve affords a more than sufficient guidance in the midst of this inevitable uncertainty.

may

The Exploration of the Holy Land.

AMONG many hopeful signs of the present age is the increasing carefulness in the study of the Holy Bible, and the awakening interest in every subject and science which can help us to a better understanding of it. There are those who say that the mixed spirit-half religion, half love of adventure-which has before now borne such important fruits in our country, is becoming extinct among a rational and calculating people; but we think that the last few years have done much to contradict this assertion, and that it would be an easy matter to point out many eminent exceptions to such a rule. The Society which, last summer, fitly held its inaugural meeting in the Jerusalem Chamber of Westminster Abbey, is not the least example. Its object, as no doubt most of our readers are aware, is to obtain funds for enabling competent persons to examine the archæology, topography, geology, and natural history of the Holy Land, together with the manners and customs of its inhabitants. We cannot, indeed, express entire approval of its prospectus; there is a systematic depreciation of the labours of past explorers, and a slightly arrogant tone of self-confidence, which we think calculated to awaken distrust in those who have studied the subject and to mislead those who have not: hence, we have thought that a brief sketch of what has been done in Palestine during the last few years might be interesting to our readers, and enable them to understand the present state of our knowledge. We shall therefore endeavour to indicate to them. what points may be regarded as placed beyond reasonable doubt, what still stand in need of further evidence, and in what quarters that may best be sought; and in so doing we shall chiefly confine ourselves, for reasons both of space and interest, to "the city of the Great King," Jerusalem.

We will commence by very briefly noticing the main points of controversy in the topography of the Holy City, and will then proceed to show what light has been thrown upon them by the works which have appeared during the current decade of the present century. Jerusalem, as it now stands, occupies a sort of plateau at the head of the Wady Kedrûn; one branch of Ll

VOL. II.

which, the Valley of Jehoshaphat, rising on the north of the city, skirts its eastern wall like a huge moat; the other, the Valley of Hinnom, after passing along the shorter western side, sweeps round the southern face to join the other branch at the Pool of Siloam. The southern end of the plateau is divided by a well-marked depression, which gradually loses itself in the heart of the city. This is the Tyropean Valley, which in former times probably ran nearly up to the north wall; some, however, think that it took a turn to the west. There seems little doubt that the higher part of the western hill is the Sion of the Bible; while the eastern hill is Moriah; its southern slope Ophel; and the northern part of the city is the Bezetha of Josephus. The form of the present city is a very irregular pentagon, with an obtuse re-entering angle on the west, and on the eastern hill is a quadrangular walled enclosure, called the Haram es-Sherif, the holy place of the Mohammedans. In the centre of this, on a low platform, stands an octagonal building crowned by a circular dome, covering a rough rock, that rises above the floor to a height of about six feet, in which is a cave; this is es-Sakharah-the Rock-on which centre so many Mohammedan legends. The building itself is called Kubbet es-Sakharah-the Dome of the Rock; and in the west (incorrectly) the Mosque of Omar. To the south of this, abutting on the city wall, is a mosque called el-Aksa, a quadrangular building, also surmounted by a dome. Just by the re-entering angle of the western wall is the citadel, part of which is, beyond all question, very ancient; and at no great distance, in the north-western corner of the city, is a Christian church, on the traditional site of the Holy Sepulchre. A very brief examination of the terrain shows that the plan and appearance of Jerusalem have undergone great changes since the commencement of the Christian era; and in the attempted restorations of the original city, the following points, among others of less importance, have given rise to much controversy-(1) the position of the Temple, (2) the course of the city walls, (3) the authenticity of the traditional site of the Holy Sepulchre.

With regard to the first of these points, all agree that the Temple of Herod stood within the present Haram enclosure, but the exact site is a matter of dispute. The contending parties, however, may be divided into two classes: those who consider the inner Temple to have occupied the platform of the Kubbet es-Sakharah, and those who place it in the south-west angle near the Aksa. The former maintain that the fortress called the Antonia occupied the greater part of the northern portion of the Haram, more especially the rock at the north-western corner;

while of the latter, some place it on the Sakharah itself, others, just on the west of it. It would occupy far too much time to give even an outline of the arguments on both sides, so we will merely say that the configuration of the ground, the ruins still remaining, and the correspondence of the site with all the indirect evidence which we possess, is the support of the former; while the latter rely almost entirely upon some actual measurements given by Josephus, which oblige them to confine the Temple to a square of about 600 feet each way in the southwestern corner of the Haram.

With regard to the second point, Josephus states that there was formerly a triple line of walls on the north of the city, the outermost of which was begun by Herod Agrippa. This, till very lately, was always supposed to have lain considerably to the north of the present town-wall; it was also evident that fortifications once ran along the slopes on each side the mouth of the Tyropean Valley, so as to enclose a considerable space now lying open on Ophel and Sion outside the city. The problem was, therefore, to re-trace the exact course of these lines, to discover whether there had been a wall along the eastern brow of Sion, and to determine the exact course of the first, second, and third lines on the north, one of which, it was believed, coincided with the present wall.

The disputants on the third point may be divided into those who believe in the genuineness of the present site of the Holy Sepulchre, those who regard it as irrecoverably lost, and those who imagine that it may be discovered elsewhere.

During the present decade two or three works have been published, which have done far more than any that have gone before them to clear up these questions; and, indeed, may be said to have placed some of them beyond reasonable doubt. Of these we propose to give a brief analysis, laying more especial stress upon those facts which appear to us to be new, and to bear upon the points in question.

We pass by Miss Beaufort's pleasant book, Egyptian Sepulchres and Syrian Shrines (1861), several pages of which are devoted to Jerusalem, not as containing nothing worthy of note, but because the information was mainly furnished to her by the author of one of the works which we are about to notice, and must therefore be regarded as his rather than hers. We must not, however, be understood to accuse the authoress of any undue use of the labours of others-far from it-there is not the slightest attempt at this, for she always frankly states her informant's name. Her book is a lively, intelligent sketch of a lengthy Eastern tour, and