primitive Gospel, that until Christianity made some steps towards the old religion by the splendour of its ceremonial, and the incipient paganising, not of its creed, but of its popular belief, there were powerful countervailing tendencies to keep him back from the new faith. And when the Greek entered into the Church, he was not content without exercising the quickness of his intelligence, and the versatilities of his language upon his creed without analysing, discussing, defining everything; or by intruding that higher part of his philosophy, which best assimilated with Christianity, he either philosophised Christianity, or for a time, as under the Neo-Platonists and Julian, set up a partially Christianised philosophy as a new and rival religion. The inveterate corruption of Roman manners confined that vigorous Christian morality, its strongest commendation to the Roman mind, at first within the chosen few, who were not utterly abased by licentiousness or by servility; and even with them in large part it was obedience to civil authority, respect for established law, perhaps in many a kind of sympathy with the lofty and independent sacerdotal dignity, the sole representative of old Roman freedom, which contributed to Christianise the Latin world.

'How much more suited were some parts of the Teutonic character to harmonise at first with Christianity, and to keep the proselytes in submission to the authority of its instructors in these sublime truths; at the same time, to strengthen the Church by the infusion of its own strength and independence of thought and action, as well as to barbarise it by that ferocity which causes, is increased by, and maintains the foreign conquests of ruder over more polished races! Already the German had the conception of an illimitable Deity, towards whom he looked with solemn and reverential awe. Tacitus might seem to speak the language of a Christian Father, almost of a Jewish prophet. Their gods could not be confined within walls, and it was degradation to these vast unseen powers to represent them under the human form. Reverential awe alone could contemplate that mysterious being whom they called divinity. These deities, or this one Supreme, were shrouded in the untrodden, impenetrable forest. Such seems to have been the sublime conception above, if not anterior to, what may be called the mythology of Teutonic religion. This mythology was the same, only in its elemental form, throughout the German tribes, with that which, having passed through more than one race of poets, grew into the Eddas of Scandinavia. Vestiges of this close relationship are traced in the language, in the mythic conceptions, and in the superstitions of all the Teutonic tribes. Certain religious forms and words are common to all the races of Teutonic descent.d In every dialect appear kindred or derivative terms for the deity, for sacrifice, for temples, and for the

c Cæterum non cohibere parietibus Deos, neque in ullam humani oris speciem adsimilare ex magnitudine cœlestium arbitrantur, Deorumque nominibus appellant secretum illud quod solâ reverentiâ vident.'-Tacitus, German. ix.

d Grimm, Deutsche Mythologie, Einleitung, pp. 9-11 (2nd edit.). The whole large volume is a minute and laborious commentary on this axiom.

priesthood. This mythic religion was in some points a nature-worship, though there might have existed, as has been said, something more ancient, and superior to the worship of the visible and impersonated powers or energies of the material world. The Romans discovered, not without wonder, that the supreme deity of the actual German worship was not invested in the attributes of their Jove, but rather of Mercury. There is no doubt that Woden was the divinity to whom they assigned this name, a name which, in its various forms (it became at length Odin), is common to the Goths, Lombards, Saxons, Frisians, and other tribes. In its primitive conception, if any of these conceptions were clear and distinct, Woden appears to have been the allmighty, all-permeating Spirit-the Mind, the primal mover of things, the all-Wise, the God of speech and of knowledge. But with a warlike people the supreme deity could not but be a god of battle, the giver of victory. He possessed, therefore, the attributes of Mars blended with those of Mercury. The conduct or the reception of departed spirits, which belonged to the pagan Mercury, may have been one function which led to his identification with the Teutonic Woden. Already, no doubt, their world of the dead was a rude Valhalla.

g

'In the earlier belief, the Thunderer, with the sun, the heavenly bodies, and the earth, the great objects of nature-worship, held only the second place. The Herthus of Tacitus was doubtless Hertha, the mother earth, or impersonated nature, of which he describes the worship in language singularly coincident with that of the Berecynthian goddess of Phrygia.h-vol. i., pp. 256–260.

e Deum maximè Mercurium colunt.'-Tacitus, Ger. ix.

fWodan sanè quem adjectâ literâ Gwodan dixerunt, ipse est qui apud Romanos Mercurius dicitur, et ab universis Germaniæ gentibus ut Deus adoratur.'-Paull. Diacon. i. 9. See also Jonas Bobbiens. Vit. Bonifac. Dies Mercurii became Wodan's day,—Wednesday. Compare Grimm, p. 108, etc., and the whole article ‘Wuotan,' which he closes with the following observation: Aber noch zu einen andern Betrachtung darf die hohe stelle führen, welche die Germanen ihrem Wuotan anweisen. Der Monotheismus ist etwas so nothwendiges und wesentliches, das fast alle Heiden in ihren Götter bunten Gewimmel, bewusst oder unbewusst, darauf ausgehn, einen obersten Gott anzuerkennen, der schon die Eigenschaften aller übrigen in sich trägt, so dass diese nur als seine Einflüsse, verjüngenden und erfrischungen zu betrachten sind. Daraus erklärt sich wie einzelne Eigenheiten bald einem bald diesem einzelnen Gott dargelegt werden, und warum die höchste Macht, nach Verschiendensheit der Völker auf den einen oder den andern derselben fällt.'

g Paulus Diacon., loc. cit. He is called Sigvödr (Siegvater) in the Edda.Grimm, p. 122.

After recounting the tribes who worship this goddess, he proceeds: 'In commune Herthum, id est, Terram Matrem colunt, eamque intervenire rebus hominum, invehi populis arbitrantur. Est in insulâ Oceani castum nemus, dicatum in eo vehiculum, veste contectum, attingere uni sacerdoti concessum. Is adesse penetrali Deam intelligit, vectamque bobus feminis multâ cum veneratione prosequitur. Læti tunc dies, festa loca, quæcunque adventu hospitioque dignatur. Non arma sumunt, clausum omne ferrum, pax et quies tunc tantùm nota, tunc tantùm amata, donec idem sacerdos satiatam conversatione mortalium Deam templo reddit; mox vehiculum et vestes, et si credere velis, numen ipsum secreto lacu abluitur. Servi ministrant, quos statim idem lacus haurit. Arcanus hinc terror, sanctaque igno.

We are struck, almost on the threshold of the Dean's labours, with the freedom from class-prejudices, a subjection to which must vitiate any historian, much more him who writes the history of the Church. He says, in the Introduction, 'It is obvious that I use Christianity, and indeed Teutonic Christianity, in its most comprehensive significance, from national episcopal churches, like that of England, which aspires to maintain the doctrines and organisation of the apostolic or immediately post-apostolic ages, onward to that dubious and undefinable verge where Christianity melts into a high moral theism, a faith which would expand to purer spirituality with less distinct dogmatic system, or that which would hardly call itself more than a Christian philosophy, a religious rationalism. I presume not, neither is it the office of the historian to limit the blessings of our religion either in this world or the world to come-" there is One who will know his own." As an historian I can disfranchise none who claim, even on the slightest grounds, the privileges and hopes of Christianity; repudiate none who do not place themselves without the pale of believers and worshippers of Christ, or of God through Christ.' Nor is this a vain boast, or a mere deference to duty; it is evident that Dr. Milman is really one who, while sincerely attached to his own form of church government, can respect the scruples of others, and see the image of Christ in those who differ from him. know that there will be found men of all parties who will not like this feature of the History of Latin Christianity, and will_brand it with the easily uttered charge of latitudinarianism. But we have no doubt the author will bear this rebuke with more magnanimity than the opposite one of being a bigot, and be more pleased to obtain the applause of an audience 'fit though few,' than to be hailed with the doubtful praises of those whose own opinion is the Dagon of their idolatry.

We

We do not feel called upon to criticise the style in which these volumes are written, but we must allude to the vein of quiet sarcasm which often shows itself, and also to the aphoristic brevity with which important sentiments are often conveyed. The writer's opinion is frequently made to appear by the turn of a sentence,

rantia, quid sit illud quod tantum perituri vident.' (Tacit. Germ. xi.) Contrast and compare these secret and awful rites (and their truce of God') with Lucretius:— Quo nunc insigni per magnas prædita terras Horrificè fertur divinæ Matris imago

Ergo cum primum magnas invecta per urbes

Munificat tacita mortales muta salute:

Aere atque argento sternunt iter omne viarum,

Largificâ stipe donantes, ninguntque rosarum

Floribus, umbrantes Matrem comitumque catervas.'-ii. 597 et seq.

as well as by a lengthy statement of it. Thus the folly of religious contention is strikingly painted in these words: A tradition has survived in the pontifical annals of a proscription, a massacre. The streets, the baths, the churches ran with blood-the streets, where the partisans of rival bishops encountered in arms; the baths, where Arian and Catholic could not wash together without mutual contamination; the churches, where they could not join in common worship to the same Redeemer' (vol. i. p. 66). Take also these instances of the same constructio prægnans. 'Did the vanity of Jerome mistake outward respect for general attachment, awe of his abilities and learning for admiration, and so blind him to the ill-dissembled, if dissembled, hostility which he had provoked in so many quarters ? . . Jerome left ungrateful Rome, against whose sins the recluse of Palestine becomes even more empassioned, whose clergy and people become blacker and more inexcusable in his harsher and more unsparing denunciations' (vol. i. p. 75). In a few strokes the Dean here clearly indicates his opinion of this father of doubtful character. 'The Alexandrians rose in defence of their magistrate; the monks were driven from the city; Ammonius seized, tortured, and put to death. Cyril commanded his body to be taken up; the honours of a Christian martyr were prostituted on this insolent ruffian; his panegyric was pronounced in the Church, and he was called Thaumasius, the Wonderful. But the more Christian of the Christians were shocked at the conduct of the Archbishop; Cyril was for once ashamed, and glad to bury the affair in oblivion' (vol. i. p. 148). A sudden and total revolution at once took place. The change was wrought-not by the commanding voice of ecclesiastical authority-not by the argumentative eloquence of any great writer, who by his surpassing abilities awed the world into peace-not by the reaction of pure Christian charity, drawing together the conflicting parties by evangelic love. It was a new dynasty on the throne of "Constantinople (vol. i. p. 206).

These volumes abound in graphic descriptions too numerous to be more than generally alluded to. We have been struck with some scenes in the life of Gregory the Great as specimens of historical painting. The whole account of Thomas à Becket is intensely interesting, and especially the description of his death. Every word tells, and the entire picture, thus made up of bold strokes and deep colouring, has a fine and deep effect. We refer our readers to the volumes themselves for illustrations, and will give what is more to our purpose-the reflections of Dr. Milman on the character of Becket.

'Thus Becket obtained by his death that triumph for which he would perhaps have struggled in vain through a long life. He was

now a saint, and for some centuries the most popular saint in England : among the people, from a generous indignation at his barbarous murder, from the fame of his austerities and his charities, no doubt from admiration of his bold resistance to the kingly power; among the clergy, as the champion, the martyr of their order. Even if the clergy had had no interest in the miracles at the tomb of Becket, the high-strung faith of the people would have wrought them almost without suggestion or assistance. Cures would have been made or imagined; the latent powers of diseased or paralysed bodies would have been quickened into active belief, and the fear of disbelieving would have multiplied one extraordinary event into a hundred: fraud would be outbid by zeal; the invention of the crafty, even if what may seem invention, was not more often ignorance and credulity, would be outrun by the demands of superstition. There is no calculating the extent and effects of these epidemic outbursts of passionate religion.

'Becket was indeed the martyr of the clergy, not of the Church; of sacerdotal power, not of Christianity; of a caste, not of mankind. From beginning to end it was a strife for the authority, the immunities, the possessions of the clergy. The liberty of the Church was the exemption of the clergy from law; the vindication of their separate, exclusive, distinctive existence from the rest of mankind. It was a sacrifice to the deified self; not the individual self, but self as the centre and representative of a great corporation. Here and there in the long full correspondence there is some slight allusion to the miseries of the people in being deprived of the services of the exiled bishops and clergy. "There is no one to ordain clergy, to consecrate virgins." The confiscated property is said to be a robbery of the poor; yet in general the sole object in dispute was the absolute immunity of the clergy from civil jurisdiction, the right, of appeal from the temporal sovereign to Rome, and the asserted superiority of the spiritual rulers in every respect over the temporal power. There might, indeed, be latent advantages to mankind, social, moral, and religious, in this secluded sanctity of one class of men; it might be well that there should be a barrier against the fierce and ruffian violence of kings and barons; that somewhere freedom should find a voice, and some protest be made against the despotism of arms, especially in a newly-conquered country like England, where the kingly and aristocratic power was still foreign; above all, that there should be a caste, not an hereditary one, into which ability might force its way up, from the most low-born, even from the servile rank; but the liberties of the Church, as they were called, were but the establishment of one tyranny-a milder, perhaps, but not less rapacious tyranny,--instead of another; a tyranny which aspired to uncontrolled, irresponsible rule, nor was above the inevitable evil produced on rulers as well as on subjects, from the consciousness of arbitrary and autocratic power.

Reflective posterity may perhaps consider as not the least remarkable point in this lofty and tragic strife, that it was but a strife for power. Henry II. was a sovereign who, with many noble and kingly qualities, lived more than even most monarchs of his age in direct vio