Birth and Education — Dundee — St. Andrews

‘HEN in 1879 I wrote “The White Fields of France,” I could go back to the simple but happy beginning of the M’All Mission in Belleville so modestly related by himself. He commenced alone; in fear, and yet in faith. It was a peculiar undertaking; and as to its future what could he say? There did not seem to be much of hope; and there was enough of difficulty to discourage ordinary men.

Comparing his first Belleville meeting in the Rue Julien Lacroix and its 106 sittings, in January, 1872, with the more than threescore meetings all over France into which that solitary station has grown, he will greatly rejoice; feeling

As did the Egyptian traveller when he stood

By the young Nile, and fathomed with his lance The first small fountains of that mighty flood.

In 1872 the prospect was not a bright one. In 1879 it was immensely brighter. And now, in 1883, it is brighter still, save for one heavy sorrow that has overshadowed it, of which we cannot yet penetrate the issue or the meaning. What the light is that may come out of this darkness remains to be seen.

In 1879 I could point to widening scenes of labour, and tell of new labourers raised up for these. Men and means were not indeed coming forward in proportion to the vastness of the field; but still the work was advancing; — no new disappointments, no formidable difficulties, and no serious checks. Many hearts, both at home and abroad, were cheered with the reports that came in from different quarters. A small periodical was started in that year, into which was gathered a great amount of intelligence from different stations and districts, with extracts from letters and journals of the various labourers. It grew in variety and interest in each issue, and gave to the Church at large the freshest and most reliable information that was to be found. Modest in tone, select in its materials, and well- written in all its articles, it was of great service to the Mission in England and Scotland. Its brief pictures of Paris missionary work were of the most telling kind, revealing the interior working of the enterprise; taking the reader into the very heart of the various operations. Its quiet but vivid sketches of the different scenes were relished exceedingly.

Since then there have been changes, many and important, though the spirit of the Mission and its general machinery have remained the same. The fields have not grown less white, and they have not yet been reaped. The work has not become less hopeful; the sphere of activity has not been narrowed; the success has not been diminished.

But the workers are not quite the same. “The greater part remain unto this present; but some are fallen asleep.” There have been changes; and it is with one of these changes that this volume has to do. It is certainly not a volume which I ever expected to write.

I thought that we might count upon many years of vigorous work from one whose name occurs frequently throughout “The White Fields of France.” The promise was bright. He was just the man for the work. It would hardly have been possible to find one so singularly fitted for the singular service. Anything like failure seemed unlikely. He was in the prime of manhood, or rather in the vigour of youth, when he took the sickle in his hand: only twenty-seven years old; in sufficient health, both of body and mind; thoroughly imbued with a true missionary spirit, and “counting not his life dear to him that he might finish his course with joy, and the ministry which he had received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the Gospel of the Grace of God.” Hopeful, fervent, and buoyant, with all his large gifts and accomplishments, he girded himself eagerly for the enterprise to which he had been called.

His service was to be shorter than we had imagined. God’s measure is not man’s measure, and length of service does not always mean length of life. To do much in little time, and without parade or noise, has been the feature most memorable in some of the truest workers whom the Master has raised up, and the Church delighted to honour.

In the case of Mr. Dodds, much was accomplished in five years. Why the five were not made fifty is not for us to say. If the shorter space had been so useful, what would not the larger have been? The outfit seemed to be all lost; and it was no common outfit. The Master, however, it seems, could spare him, though we were saying that we could not. Who is to carry on his work? is a question not for us to answer, but for Him who gave and took him. The work was His, and so was the workman. The field remains, and He will see to the reapers. The lesson for us is to work while it is day.

No Christian dies too early; and no workman is

Bwth and Education.

taken from his work too soon. The short time and the sudden removal are no doubt parts of the great agency by which the work is to be expanded and matured: perhaps I may specially add deejpened; for work, like that among the Paris ouvriers, needs times of deepening and consolidation. How the sacrifice of one of its best labourers is to accomplish this, we see not. Man could not venture on such sacrifices; for he cannot calculate effects. But He to whom all such calculations are easy, and all such results open, can and may. We have but to look on, and wonder and believe. “What I do, thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter.” His way is in the sea; His path in the great waters; His footsteps are not known.

In our judgment, the labourer could ill be spared, when the fields were widening and the open doors multiplying. But in the judgment of One far wiser than we, his services were no longer required. The Master had got out of him all that He purposed; and the reaping must now pass into other hands. He knew, too, that His servant needed rest, — much more even than we knew, who saw him in his weary nights and busy mornings. Our hopes were broken; but these human hopes are not the measure of the Divine will. That will contains something better for us and for France than all that our hopes had sketched or fancied. The Lord of the harvest knows what He is doing. There is nothing capricious in His movements. He knows when to raise up, and when to cast down. He knows, too, what workmen are needed, and what are not needed. The work is His, not ours. The instruments are in His hands, not in ours. We refer the whole case to Him; and hand over to Him both failure and success. He holds Himself responsible for both.

On the 9th of September, 1882, George Theophilus Dodds rested from his labours, at the age of thirty-two. Far from father and mother, brother and sister; far from his dear friends in Scotland, and from those no less dear, in the land of his adoption, he lay down upon a sick-bed from which he was not to rise. In a lonely dwelling, on the edge of a barren moor, five miles from the nearest post-town; no village near; in just such a retreat as in a day of health would have been very desirable, he was strangely stricken down; and the rest which he had come to seek was exchanged for one more perfect and enduring. After twelve days of illness, in great prostration and pain and weariness, with only his beloved wife and two dear Christian friends to soothe his death-bed and close his eyes, on the afternoon of a bright sunny Saturday he passed away.

Five years were the limits of his service: no more.

Birth and Educatio7i,

or rather somewhat less; for it was not till the beginning of November, 1877, that he went into regular work, and took up his abode at Belleville, settling down, as Mr. M’All had done, in the very heart of that wild district, and of the strange population whose welfare he had come to seek.

Into these five years he had crowded an extraordinary measure of work of all kinds, — patient, arduous, successful work, so that one could hardly believe that one so young could have undergone such an amount of fatigue, mental and bodily, and borne such a strain upon his constitution, as these brief years must have required. His career was short; but it was manfully begun, conscientiously filled up, and honourably ended. As an example of missionary self-denial, of enduring hardness, of manly perseverance, and of indifference to ease and comfort, it may well be set before the young men of our day for iinitation; for it will not be worth the admiring if it be not also imitated.

Here is a record of self-consecration. It does not connect itself with foreign missions, but simply with European work. Not the less, however, on that account, is it an example for the youth of all churches. The work in Paris was quite as heavy and as self-sacrificing as it could have been in India or China; the only difference being the lesser distance from home, and the fuller equipment in language of the workman for his special work before setting out. No one who may offer himself for the Paris field need do so under the idea that the work will be of an easier kind, demanding a more commonplace outfit, or offering somewhat of ease and leisure. If he starts with any such idea he will soon be undeceived, and find that he is not the man for Paris, where “enduring hardness” is the rule for all workers, male or female. Tourists have seldom troubled themselves about missionary work in Paris. Even Christian men have hitherto overlooked it. They have visited the Louvre, the Madeleine, Notre Dame, the Arc de Triomphe, the Place de la Concorde, the Champs Elysees; but the grandest sights of all, — the Salles, with their ouvrier gatherings, they have not inquired for. They have “done” Paris, and wearied themselves in body and soul; but they have rushed past these interesting halls which angels might “desire to look into,” without even stopping to listen to the happy songs, or the good news, or the invitations to the passing crowds. Of the hundred thousand visitors who rush through Paris every summer from the British Islands, how few could tell you anything of these bright meetings! Some have never heard of them; some have heard of them, but they were too much occupied with sight-seeing to go out of their

Birth and Edticatiofi. 9

way to find out even the nearest mission-station. SomO; returning from the opera, might pass the mission door, or encounter the weary worker, — perhaps a lonely lady, — threading her way to the “Home” where the female workers reside; but what was she to them, or what was her work to an excited sightseer, or a lover of pleasure, with the music of the opera still ringing in his ears?

The true sights of Paris are not what the gay crowd flocks to, or what the paid commissionaires can point out, or what forms the subject of conversation at the tahle-d’hotey or what the handbook enumerates, — but those in which humble men and women, not counting their lives dear to them, are spending and being spent in gathering in the refuse of Parisian society, — the furthest gone of the waifs of humanity. The real “spectacles” of the French capital are the nightly gatherings of the poor ouvriers listening to the “new religion” with happy eagerness, and singing with all their strength, both old and young, not the Marseillaise or the profane song, but the “Cantiques Populaires” — the hymns of everlasting life.

Perhaps our Christian tourists, when next they visit the city of two millions, — the city wholly given to pleasure, — will think of these things and be less eager in their desire to see and hear all the gay things which Paris has to attract the eye and ear.

lo Memoir of Rev. G. T. Dodds,

Perhaps, too, they will think as they pass along the Rue de Rivoli or the Place du Trocadero, of the toil and weariness of those devoted workers who, it will be admitted, present a singular contrast to the pleasure-crowds whose eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor whose ear with hearing the wonders of the gay city. The band of self-denying seekers of the lost, now toiling in the lowest lanes and in the midst of the most wretched population, is one that even the gay world might admire, if it would take the trouble to look into one of their halls, or go a- visiting with them for a single day.

Not that the workers think their lot a hard one, or wish to be thought martyrs. Far from it. They go about their work with glad hearts, and return from it, generally towards midnight, happy and undiscouraged. They feel quite safe in the streets of Paris, at all hours; and as for weariness and discomfort, these are common to all such labourers, in London, Paris, or Edinburgh. The fewness of the labourers is the chief complaint; so that when even one new reaper comes into the field with a sharp sickle there is rejoicing; and when one leaves, or is taken away in the Providence of God, — especially if that one be a foremost man, — there is no common mourning. The loss of one out of a thousand is not so sorely felt; but the loss of one out of a score is an overwhelming calamity. Were the work not the work of God, such a loss would awaken despair. Yet sorrowful as have been the hearts of the noble Paris band because of Mr. Dodds’ sad removal, and dark as the shadow has been that has rested over the Mission now a whole year, there is no despondency, but only increasing zeal and faith. The work goes on with all its former vigour and hopefulness, however deeply the blank is felt. He is missed; but his memory and example remain. The Mission-Salles are his true and best monument, and his converts are the immortelles laid upon his tomb.

He was born at Lochee, a suburb of Dundee, on the second of June, 1850. His father is the honoured minister of the Free Church there, and his mother, who died a few months after her son, was Isabella Gardner Dickson, daughter of the Rev. John Dickson, missionary for some time at Astrakan in Southern Russia, who, along with one or two other devoted missionaries, was compelled to leave that country and return home, in consequence of the jealousy of the Russian Government, and its dread of the freelycirculated Scriptures. It was well that these self-den3dng men got ojGf with simple extrusion from the Czar’s dominions and banishment to their native land.

Early in the present century some missionaries left Scotland for Karass, on the borders of Circassia,

Most of them succumbed to the hardships and dangers to which they were exposed in that uncivilised region. Mr. and Mrs. Dickson (along with another missionary) were spared for further usefulness. To replace those who were removed, another reinforcement was sent out. After some years, Messrs. Mitchell and Dickson removed to Astrakan, as a better centre for the translation and printing of the Scriptures and Catechisms already in progress. Here they had ample means of itinerating among the surrounding villages of Tartars. Mr. Dickson was engaged simultaneously with two translations, one designated Tartar-Turkish, the other Tartar. The formation of a Bible Society, the frequent and encouraging visits of the Archbishop, the arrival of missionaries and strangers, besides their constant intercourse with the natives, enlivened their sojourn in Astrakan. After some time the hierarchy began to look unfavourably on the mission work, and this ultimately led to the removal of the Missionaries. Mr. Dickson devoted himself to the carrying on of the translation, and completed it as far as the Minor Prophets, when death arrested his pen. His youngest daughter, Isabella, deeply impressed with the wants of the heathen world, wished to devote herself to the mission-field. She was thought too young at the time, and afterwards was married to Mr. Dodds of Lochee, where George Theophilus was born. His mother, meditating on the gift she had received, consecrated him to the Lord, and proposed that Theophilus should be added to his name, — asking for him that he might early love the Lord.

In boyhood he was cheerful and buoyant; full of energy and vivacity; fond of the amusements and sports of his age; yet never idle nor indolent; always studious, and desirous of gleaning information on all subjects, wherever he might be; of retentive memory, and quick in application of all he knew. Thoroughly earnest and conscientious, he did not allow recreation to interfere with study or with duty. Uprightness and conscientiousness were his characteristics, even from childhood. It was remarked of him that he always seemed to know what was right. And what he knew he did.

He owed much to his beloved mother.* In her

* Dr. Hodge, of Princeton, records an experience like the above: — “Our early training was religious. Our mother was a Christian; she took us regularly to church, and carefully drilled us in the Westminster Catechism. There has never been anything remarkable in my religious experience, except that it began very early. I think that in my childhood I came nearer to conforming to the Apostle’s injunction, pray without ceasing,’ than in any other period of my life. As far back as I can remember, I had the habit of thanking God for everything I received, and asking Him for everything I wanted. If I lost a book or plaything, I prayed that I might find it. I prayed walking along the streets, in school, and out of school, whether playing or studying, — it seemed natural (” Life,” p. 13).

walks with him in childhood she taught him botany, having herself no inconsiderable knowledge of that science. Thus early he became imbued with that love of natural history, which developed itself in after-life. Being also a linguist, and knowing several modern languages, such as Italian, Russian, Tartar, &c., she gave an early impulse to his linguistic tastes. Above all, as the daughter of a missionary, she filled his young mind with missionary yearnings which never left him, — though the extent of his missionary ideas then was that “he would go and preach to the blacks.” We shall see how this developed itself afterwards, and that his work in Paris was the fulfilment of his early longings, though as yet he knew nothing of Paris or ouvriers.

His entrance on the narrow way had nothing about it sudden or marked. He had from very early days a longing after God, a desire to do what was right, and a wish to be of use to his fellow-men. A father’s and a mother’s teaching had early told upon him. But the clear light did not break in all at once. A few weeks before he died he said, “I have too little sense of my own sinfulness. Even when a child, I seem to have wished to do what was right, — if I had only known how.” Thus, imperceptibly, the Spirit of God wrought His work in him from the first; the light of certainty and peace did not come till later on. But when it came it remained unbroken to the last. He shrank intuitively from evil. Both at school and college he turned away from words and scenes of impropriety. His decision in these things was very noticeable. His conscience in these years was tender; sometimes it might appear morbid. In later years, while there was the same tenderness, the morbid feeling was gone, not a shade of it remained. No one ever felt more free to enjoy with thankfulness all the good things which God gave. Though not unacquainted with depression, few have worked more in the liberty of Christ.

He received his early education first at the Lochee Free Church School, and then at the High School of Dundee, which he entered in 1861, and where he proved his diligence as a scholar. He was satisfied with nothing short of success in what he undertook. Kindly, unselfish and obliging, he made himself many friends. But of those juvenile days there are almost no records nor reminiscences.

The classical department was then under Dr. Richard Low, whose unwearied endeavours for the progress and welfare of his pupils will be long remembered by all who knew him. Under him, George’s love of languages, hitherto latent, was developed, until in college days it grew into a passion. The books in various languages — Arabic, Turkish, and others — which he found in his father’s library, he early began to examine; and there lies beside me a Turkish New Testament, with his name on the fly-leaf, indicating that he had resolved to attack it, though I am not aware that in after years he prosecuted his Oriental studies to any extent. His great work for the last five years absorbed all his studies.

Though at school he worked hard, he relished athletic sports and outdoor recreations of all kinds. In his numerous country rambles he carried out his love of natural science, and added to the knowledge of botany which he had gained from his mother. He never, indeed, became a scientific botanist; but he retained and enlarged his early knowledge in after years, so that wherever he travelled, at home or abroad, he had an eye on the flora of the places, and used to write to his friends about them, especially the ferns he met with, sending specimens in his letters. He was thus unconsciously furnished with illustrations for his Parisian classes and meetings in later days; and many a striking enforcement or elucidation of Divine truth he gathered from the fields and gardens and woods. In conversing with or preaching to the poor Parisian ouvrier he found his knowledge of natural history, picked up in various past years, most serviceable.

“His Saturday holidays,” says his brother, “were spent mostly in long walks, during which he laid the foundation of an accurate knowledge of many branches of natural history. ... As relaxation from work he cultivated music and the arts, in which he delighted. At St. Andrews, as afterwards in Edinburgh, he was a leading spirit in the Students’ Missionary Society. Even in these days he displayed his marvellous capacity for work, and the enthusiasm which he showed in everything which he took up.”

The holiday rambles of a young student reveal character more than is generally supposed; and bear upon his training for future work more than he himself at the time would reckon possible; occasionally they may be unprofitable, no doubt; but at other times useful in the education both of mind and body; sometimes only the indulgence of youthful levity, but in other cases thoughtfully gone about as preparation for more serious life.

He entered the University of St. Andrews in November, 1866, and remained there during the greater part of the usual four years’ course; exhibiting proficiency in all his classes, but specially in languages and moral philosophy. In the latter class, besides other honours, he gained the prize for the best essay on the philosophy of Spinoza. His remembrances of college days, as he has more than once told me, were of a somewhat mingled kind; as, indeed, the college reminiscences of most of us are, both respecting ourselves and our fellow-students. Of our college companions how often have we seen that verse fulfilled: “The first shall be last, and the last first.” He did not trifle; and in after years he expressed himself strongly regarding the way in which some students loitered through their curriculum, evincing no sense of responsihility, nor concern as to their future career; looking on college sessions as periods of deliverance from home control; indulging their tastes, not cultivating their minds, nor bracing themselves for a life of energy and usefulness.

He had great patience with the honest doubter, but none with those who “played with doubts;” and when asked once whether he had not passed through a period of doubt like other men, he said, “I have been attacked by doubt, but I never consented to it; I hated it all the time.” Thus he wrote to a friend, 15th February, 1875 : —

“How well I know that withering chill — ‘that boundless nothing’ — these cold and false ’ eternal silences.’ I have felt as if entangled in the mysteries of some subtle system — error from first to last, I knew, with hardly a line of truth in the woven tissues that net-like surrounded me. * As for me, my feet were almost gone, my steps had well-nigh slipped.’ These times are in a measure gone — mental problems are hardly what trouble me now. I thank God that they are more spiritual now; not that they are less dangerous, but mental troubles are marks of an earlier stage, surely, in the Christian life.”

He was always in earnest, with a high sense of duty actuating him; so that while he was thoroughly social and genial, he was never led aside into frivolity or vice. He had a tender conscience, which made him shun evil, and as he looked along the opening years of life, he saw a future which, whatever it might turn out, would unquestionably be greatly moulded by the complexion of his college life. The responsibilities of being had begun to weigh up)on him, perhaps unconsciously, as upon many a youth brought up in a Christian family. He was only beginning life; but he wanted to begin it well; and besides, his heart was even then set on the ministry. The inconsistencies or eccentricities of some of his fellow-students troubled him; and in after years he frequently referred to them. But they were to him beacons, not models.

He did well in all his classes; but his greedy love of knowledge of all kinds kept him from caring to work for honour or ambition. He had, all his life, a great contempt for “cramming” and “coaching.” All knowledge with him had not so much to be learned as assimilated. Any one who conversed with him must have observed how thorough in his case this assimilation had been. All that he studied had been absorbed into his mental and spiritual system, so to be really part of himself; and that not in the way of conglomeration or accretion, but of assimilation. In looking back on these days in 1874, he writes: “I have forgotten college metaphysics; not the science itself, but the weary pages of theories which I never cared for.”

I could tell the young student, who may read these pages, many a sorrowful story of misspent college days; — and of some who, though spared to be useful in the Church, and delivered from many of the consequences of youthful idleness, or worse, — to the last bore traces of early folly, and lamented to me most bitterly the frivolities of their wasted youth.

He studied philosophy, both ancient and modern, investigating it on all sides, and in all its lights and shades. The Moral Philosophy class he specially enjoyed; and frequently spoke of it in later years. His remarks afterwards upon his studies and his professors showed how various had been his reading, and how intelligently he had passed through it all. He became early aware of the strength of the currents, both upper and under, that were operating upon the intellect of the day, and threatening to land it almost unconsciously upon the shoals of a most subtle and plausible unbelief. Perhaps the thing that struck him most was the amount which he would require to surrender of all that he had learned to account precious, if he surrendered anything at all. Faith and unbelief were the two parties before him; with one of which he must identify himself The points under discussion might be undefined, and the issues undeveloped, or rather hidden in mist; but the question presenting itself in embryo was, “Faith or unbelief, which is it to be?” With one of these he must cast in his lot; and he felt that his doing so was not a mere metaphysical conclusion, but a decision which had eternal bearings upon himself and others. He had gone through some struggles; but faith had prevailed, even though his full decision for Christ had not yet unfolded itself.*

* In the autobiography of Kollner, a German pastor of the last century — a most interesting but little known volume — there is a striking paragraph narrating his first experience of a German university. It may interest some student-readers: — “In the

autumn of the year 1780 I entered the university at as a good

evangelical Christian, acknowledging Jesus Christ as my atonement and mediator, and God as my father and provider through him. Here began a new division of my life, which was highly important, but at the same time equally dangerous to my faith. Even during the first half-year my faith became like a reed, blown hither and thither by the wind, and like a ball, with which the professors might play, and did play at their pleasure, because my power of discrimination was still too imperfect rightly to estimate everything I heard, and because I was still totally unacquainted with the spirit of the times, which, even then, had powerful influence. I am now indeed aware that the path which had been prepared by rendering the canon of Scripture suspected, was, even at that period, universally trodden, and a heterodox theology was the first to enter upon it with gigantic step. For a short time only I was surprised at the exegetical expositions of Scripture, which were entirely opposed to my

One thing that helped to keep him safe was his

system, and especially to those passages which I had hitherto regarded as irrefragable proofs of the divinity of Jesus. I was soon not only accustomed to hear the tendency of every such passage flatly explained away, but I also persuaded myself that it could not be otherwise than as I heard it delivered from the pulpit. Satan now began to carry on his work in me; and the first thing he wrought was a disregard and contempt for my former teachers when at school. In my eyes, they were only ignorant, weak-minded people, not worthy to unloose the shoes’ latchet of the supremely wise heads of the university; nay, I even thought myself much more enlightened than they.

The idea, indeed, frequently recurred to me, — what becomes of Jesus Christ if He is not the true God, and my Mediator and Redeemer, if His death is not the great means of my reconciliation, and if He did not shed His blood for the remission of my sins? This idea occasionally made me suspect the mighty wisdom I heard from the professor’s chair, but only for a very short time; for who could bring any objection against the arguments of these teachers — or rather, who could resist their persuasive eloquence? Not I. I attempted, indeed, a few times, to lay my perplexities before God in prayer, and to implore His light; but I soon clearly perceived that my heart continued cold, and no longer felt the emotion it had formerly experienced. The reason of this was quite natural — I was in reality already captivated by the new system; how, then, could my prayer be heard, seeing that James expressly demands of the Christian, in order to pray in a proper manner, that he ’ ask in faith, nothing wavering “? My earnestness in prayer diminished still more, when, according to the new dogmatical system, prayer was asserted to be no longer that which it had hitherto been to me. It was thus my faith was tossed hither and thither amidst a thousand doubts; and it would certainly have suffered a total shipwreck, if the adorable Saviour of souls had not intervened and raised up for me a patron and a friend, who made it a matter of conscience to draw me back from the gulf which yawned before me.” The title of the book is “The Return to Taith; exemplified in the Life of William Kollner; written by Himself.” The English translation was published in London in 1836.

SL Andyews. 23

modesty. He was manly, yet humble; willing to learn, and tenacious of what he had found to be true. Unobtrusive, but not timid, he thought and acted for himself.

Of theological controversies his knowledge was, of course, at this stage imperfect; but his early philosophical and philological readings at St. Andrews prepared him for the deeper and larger discussions of his after years.

His linguistic tastes soon displayed themselves, and his facility for acquiring languages found scope to itself in different channels, apart from his immediate and direct studies. It was now that he laid the foundations of that minute and correct knowledge of comparative grammar and philology which he carried with him to the last. The niceties of language, both classical and modern, were peculiarly his study, not only as regards grammar, but the origin and function of words, — the history of particles which sometimes escape notice from the common philologist. No one could converse with him on such subjects without feeling how completely he was master of the delicacies and beauties of words, and how well he had learned, both in conversation and correspondence, to make use of his linguistic studies. His leisure hours, or indeed any minutes that could be spared from the regular curriculum, were divided between philology and the reading of Ruskin’s works, which had cast their spell over him at this time.

Though he was obliged latterly, on account of his immense correspondence, to write rapidly, his letters were remarkably correct and flowing. Though time did not allow him to go through a philological course of study, still he did not read superficially, but pushed his way by a natural linguistic sagacity into etymological details with great completeness and accuracy. He made himself acquainted with almost everything that was in the line of philological discovery for many years; not only in English, but in German and French. The reading might sometimes be rapid in his busy years, but it was sufficient to render him master of such details as were new to him.

In all these departments of study his accuracy was conspicuous. His philological memory was very retentive, aided, no doubt, by the delicacy of his musical ear. Words were to him real pictures, or, rather, living things, — creatures with souls. The simplest sounds of language were fraught with meaning to his ear. To natural sounds as well as to natural objects he used to trace up simple and common words.

He loved the classics and studied them. The study of them connected itself with philology, which would have ultimately become a “ruling passion” with him had not higher objects risen into view. But the love of Christ’s Gospel and the desire to preach it to his fellow-men, far off or near, soon absorbed other longings. Philology was to him an intensely kuman study, branching off in so many various directions, such as the character and history of ancient races and religions, and capable of being used most effectively as a buttress of Christian truth. He thought that whatever there might be of doubt or conflict in scientific discovery, the evidence of history and language was overwhelming in favour of the Bible and its truths.

Mathematics lacked interest to him, though he studied them. They were not human enough for him. Homo sum might well have been his motto in the choice of his studies. Their abstractions did not contain enough of humanity to attract him beyond a certain point. The abstractions of metaphysics were more akin to flesh and blood.

At St. Andrews, however, he overstudied. Here that temperament, which was both his weakness and his strength, showed itself. Not only did he here manifest that true-heartedness in doing work, which came out in his after-life; but his love of knowledge impelled him. He had no relish for the follies of college life. It was not merely that he felt bound to do well all that he did; but he could not help himself. He went into all his studies with ardour and wholeheartedness. He loved study for its own sake. But he studied too closely and continuously. As in the last year of his life it was evident that there was a sort of almost morbid fervency in his zeal, impelling him forward, and leading him to forget both his bodily and mental frame; so it appears to have been at college. He injured himself, and retarded by nearly two years, his projected curriculum of study; perhaps, too, sowing the seeds of weakness and exhaustion in his constitution. The overwork and illness supervening hindered him from taking his degree, and compelled him for a time to retire from college study, and to relieve himself by accepting a tutorship, as we shall see; in the discharge of which he not only secured rest, but was enabled to brace himself for future work. He then gave ample proof of his accomplishments, not only as possessing the needful knowledge, but as singularly able to communicate it to the young. He was a thorough and skilful teacher.

All the little things of early life tell in many ways upon the greater things of busy and more earnest years. The little movements of a child’s life, or a boy’s life, do not terminate with childhood or boyhood, but project themselves into the far future.

The trivial crosses, or sorrows, or joys, or occupations, or friendships, work themselves into our lifetime’s history; and we are often, when least aware of it, making use of what we passed through in those years of whose events we remember but little. Our books of childhood, with their stories, their songs, their hymns, their quaint and rude illustrations, make themselves visible in manhood, and mould our later being. The traits of character, too, but half developed in youth, and sometimes unduly self-suppressed, or unfairly dealt with by unskilful instructors or parents, — sometimes, perhaps, unwisely cherished or left untrained through negligence or partiality, come out to tinge, with their peculiarities of good or evil, the manhood with which they are all inseparably linked. In such men as Mr. Dodds, it is interesting to connect the boy with the man, — St. Andrews with Paris, — and see how God was training His servant for his future brief but important work.

St. Andrews and Paris are somewhat distant from each other. The turret of St. Regulus is not to be discerned from the towers of Notre Dame. But here there is a link between them. Some one, perhaps, having heard the story of the St. Andrews student and his work on the banks of the Seine, will, the next time he ascends the tower of the great French cathedral, turn his eye wistfully northward and mark the direction in which lie St. Andrews and Dundee, eight hundred miles between.

Yet it is Mr. Dodds the missionary, not Mr. Dodds the scholar or the student, that will be the connecting link in many minds between France and Scotland in our day. His early preparation for his French work, which we have thus briefly noticed, may lead some of our students to look the subject in the face, even in their undergraduate studies, and quietly consider what bearing “the Arts Classes” may have upon their ultimate career. Mr. Dodds, as we shall see, had his eye early upon the mission field, though he came to no final decision; so they may look a little before them, and, without deciding anything in the early part of their curriculum, may so shape some of their studies that they may be more ready for mission work, should that be the door of usefulness which may open to them.

But it is hardly worth while to dwell on these things. The later part of his life completely absorbed the earlier, and his name will always be connected with Paris, not with St. Andrews or Edinburgh. Only one likes to draw together the various links in the career of such a man. They formed part of one life, and that not a common one: and though, at the time, unimportant, they all, with more or less power and distinctness, combined to make him what he afterwards became. Our early college life is like the underground stage of the tree, when its whole future is wrapped up in a small brown seed, very unlike its full-grown greatness. But we have pleasure at times in comparing the seed with the tree, and thinking how much of the mature excellence was owing to the hidden process which foretold little of what was to come, and yet which was absolutely necessary to the development both of flower and fruit.

Before closing this chapter, we may notice his work as a student. It was while at St. Andrews, as we have noticed, that he wrote the elaborate essay on “The Philosophy of Spinoza,” which obtained the prize at the Moral Philosophy Class in the year 1870. It occupies one hundred and fifty octavo pages — half-bound in a volume, on whose title-page he has transcribed a peculiar motto —

“A God that could be understood would be no God at all,”

in the German manuscript style, — showing how, even at this time, he had not only mastered that language, but had taught himself its peculiar style of penmanship. In order to write this essay, he must have read very considerably, and mastered several little-known volumes, both of philosophy and history, in Latin, French, German, as well as in English. The essay is no copy or reproduction of other men’s thoughts. It is the result of a most minute study of Spinoza himself, and the analysis of his works in general, as well as of his philosophy, shows how completely he had grasped Spinoza’s thoughts, subtle as these are, and difficult to lay hold of. The brief sketch of the philosopher’s life is very interesting. The precocious Jewish boy, Baruch (afterwards translated into Benedict) Spinoza, the pupil of the Rabbis, — the scorner of Rabbinical traditions, the questioner both of Judaism and Christianity, the subtle logician, the assailant of all religions, the accomplished pantheist, the proud egotist, — all these different revelations of character and intellect, displaying no ordinary power and genius, are brought out with great skill and vividness in Mr. Dodds’ essay. It is the production of a man of forty, not of a student of nineteen.

We pass over the masterly analysis of Spinoza’s ethics and theological speculations given in the first sixty pages of the essay; and we present an extract as to the logical and mental processes of the philosopher: —

“We have particular objections to offer to Spinoza’s use of the deductive method, and his potent, rigid, but very irrational logic in use along with the deductions. There are dangers attending the exclusive use of logic. There are dangers attending the exclusive occupation of the intellect, apart from all other faculties which deserve as much attention as either of these. Instead of becoming developments of our nature for aiding others, and for mutual help, these undoubtedly at last become mere excrescences. They become quite unnatural and stiff, because they have been so long accustomed to stand by themselves. They come to lose all inherent life, just as the arm of the devotee becomes stiff, and in a manner lifeless, by being held for a long period in one position. Thus, these faculties are unable to recognise their relative power: their dependence on higher principles. They cannot see the use of any other faculties, for they are deluded into a false idea that they are sufficient and self-supporting. Their lifelessness and rigidity prevents them combining with the other faculties of our nature. Thus, while these are lifeless and rigid — the others, by neglect, or denial of their existence, become no less so. Spinoza fell into error here. He developed his one sole idea at the expense of the most important parts of our nature, and whether he saw the necessity of not acknowledging or boldly denying their existence, it comes to the same result, — they have or cannot have any place in the system.

“We find fault with Spinoza’s use of logic, for logic is only the formal and instrumental part of truth. When logic occupies the place of reason, we entirely ‘lose the sense of elementary truth, and the very instincts of our nature.’ Then logic becomes irreverent of all truths higher than itself; becomes irrational by denying reason its place. ‘Nothing is so terrible as logic in irrationality.’ Logic may give form, and even energy to reason, but it cannot create the facts, or give us the impressions produced by facts, or produce in our minds conviction of the truth of principles founded on these facts: it may assist, but a logical deductive process will not stand alone and precede reason.

“Logic, as an abstraction, Pascal hints, may shake everything, do away with intuition, lead to fatalism and utter scepticism.

“The application of mathematical reasoning by Spinoza to his ethics is most unjust and false. We know that we are to proceed onwards, and get at last to something by means of inductive steps. This, at least, holds true in a philosophy of the human mind. Geometrical reasoning is the very opposite. The subject in mathematical reasoning is identical with the attribute. Thus, two and two make four; when we have the word ’ four,* we simply give a new name to two plus two; we do not describe a property of two plus two. This rigid logic of Spinoza became transformed into sophistry; he proved, or tried to prove, too much; and so his reasoning put reason at last to flight.

“There is nothing, on the whole, so entirely injurious to the mind, as a continual use of logic to the exclusion of all else. Spinoza is a remarkable example of this. Facts are nothing to him; and between facts and a logical exigence he never hesitates. His mind became, at last, utterly callous to all feeling or moral sentiment, by grasping with so firm a hold such a hard and heartless tool as that of logic. Scientific deduction, logical dexterity and potentiality are not what improve the judgments of a man’s mind. They would seem to tend to make it less and less delicate in its perceptions; and the intellect thus treated finds itself embarrassed even in the midst of the realities of life.

“Spinoza’s method utterly excludes the possibility of arriving at satisfactory results in the science of ethics; and yet he writes on all the subjects that are connected with such a science. The highest moral problems — man’s most sacred and precious interests, are rigorously examined, and generally in a way included in his ethics. The cold, senseless weapon of his too potent logic could never fail to bring him to the conclusions he came to. It was indeed a ‘free necessity’ that led him or impelled him on.

“The use of a purely a priori method in treating of ethical or any philosophical subjects is vicious. It leads the reasoner to reason in a circle: he never gets one step beyond his beginning, kS/. Andrews. he repeats in different forms what was said at first. The employment of such a method leads to no results. The adoption of a synthetic instead of an analytic method is of no use for further knowledge; it leads us round in a circle, but never conducts us on to anything else. There is a necessity of an a priori element in all philosophy; indeed, it is a part of our philosophical basis; but the exclusive use of it leads to no results whatever.

“We object very much to his geometrical process of reasoning. If there is any method of reasoning that cannot with any sense be applied to metaphysics, ethics, or even psychology, it is that of geometrical reasoning. Metaphysics, in all its problems, is doomed to a kind of uncertainty, which cannot be got rid of. Ethics is not an established and unchangeable science in the sense that geometry and algebra are. We believe, no doubt, in facts connected with our mental and moral nature; but every person does not accept these facts; and even if he accepts them, does not build on them the same structure as we do. No person ever thinks of denying the axioms, postulates, propositions, corollaries of geometry. No person ever thinks of questioning the truth of an equation or an algebraical sum, after proof by the deductive process. When we come into the region of metaphysics and ethics, we are in an entirely different position. We feel as if we were in the twilight of knowledge, in a dusky and debateable land; where, unless the ideas we trust in had some unresolvable substance of their own, darkness and gloom would certainly reign supreme. The line of the horizon of metaphysical and ethical truth is to some extent always irregular and undefined. It is sometimes as difficult to mark the time of sunrise as of sunset, uncertainty seems to be so strong; too powerful for our eyesight. We are to lay what basis we can for a true development of metaphysical and ethical science; and strive with our utmost power to show the tenableness of this basis, and the certain untenableness of all others. But we cannot demonstrate

D in metaphysical regions and ethical regions, as we can in the dry and arid regions of geometry. Life has a mystery about it, which will not submit to the rigorous, cold, and untesting weapon of logic or geometrical reasoning. We must be content to accept what is given us clearly, and which is its own evidence. It is insolent to insist on demonstration: at a certain degree of evidence, evidence ceases to be found; for what was evidence in the object, we have now certainty in the subject. For evidence is a quality of the object; while certainty is a condition of the subject. It is a condition of the subject, and we are surely above all things, conditioned to accept — without questioning — that of which we may be said to be the condition. Spinoza could not see that the lifelessness and abstract qualities of geometry had nothing whatever to do with subjects which involve all the problems of our life. It is undoubtedly true that ‘algebra does not mingle with the air we breathe.’ Neither has it anything to do with the source — the cause of the phases of our mysterious existence.”

We add another extract which shows us how thoroughly the author had apprehended Spinoza’s views, and how clearly he saw the fallacies on which they were based. The general reader may not follow what we have quoted, but the student will; and whether he agrees with Mr. Dodds’s argument or not, will acknowledge its fairness and acuteness: —

“Spinoza denies freewill to God and man. We have been attempting to show that there is such a thing as freewill in man, and it cannot therefore be denied to God; for, again, fatalism — necessity could not give rise to freedom, but the very opposite. If it is established for man, it is also established for God. No more can the Infinite come from the finite, the

Unconditioned from the conditioned, than freewill from fatality or blind necessity.

“The application of such views of our nature to his whole philosophy does not make us at all wonder at the view he takes of God.

“There we are led into a very confusing and peculiar way of treatment. In his struggle to get face to face with undetermined being, Spinoza’s God becomes a pure abstraction from whence there can come nothing. As he sees this, he goes on to subtle disquisition on perfection and imperfection. Even his own slighted consciousness condemns him, and he tries to account for his views, and show their tenableness; and at last exhausts himself in mere contradictory jargon. The dilemmas in which M. Saisset so clearly involves him, in his arguments about the nature of God need only be referred to here. If ever the logic of Spinoza received a destructive blow at all, it was when Saisset framed these dilemmas.

“Spinoza takes his stand on —

* Omnis determinatio negatio est,’ and he must get to undetermined being. He tries and fails, because from undetermined being he cannot proceed one step; if he does succeed in advancing, it is at the expense of contradicting himself at every step. Suppose a perfect absolutely undetermined existence: the very opposite, and not only negative of this must Le determined and imperfect being. It is surely evident that one opposite is not the cause, or to keep in pantheistic phraseology ’ an emanation ’ of its counter-opposite. Therefore, how can absolutely perfect being give rise to imperfect being; how could that which is of itself, and absolutely undetermined, give rise to determined being; how, in other words, could it determine itself. By Spinoza’s definition, all-absorbing as it is, of substance as the one being, he cannot begin to add on to it consistently; and yet he does so. He tells us it is an absolute necessity’ for the perfect to become

36 Memoir of Rev. G. Z”. Dodds,

imperfect; but, as Professor Saisset says, * That is a big word, intended to palliate a perfectly arbitrary hypothesis.’ The absurdity of this assumption prevents its refutation by us; it refutes itself. A weighty sentence from Montesquieu strikes us as very appropriate here: ‘Those who have said that a blind fatality has produced all the effects which we see in the world, have said a great absurdity; for what greater absurdity than a blind fatality, which should have produced intelligent beings ’ (‘Esprit des Lois,’ Bk. I., cap. i.). And so it is as great an absurdity, and a patent contradiction, for Spinoza to say that the perfect begets the imperfect, the undetermined the determined. For Spinoza it is not allowable at all; in other philosophies it is different, for our views of the created and Infinite Being have not the boldness and arbitrariness of his. We do not know the Infinite, — the Absolute; Spinoza thought he did, and miserably failed in the attempted exposition of his thought.

“Spinoza falls into the same error likewise, in viewing God under the attributes he distinguishes or determines Him by. God, by Himself, has no ideas, and does not think in any particular (for that would be a determination) way. He is pure undetermined thought. Again the absurdity rises. As God is all, and includes all in One, how is it possible that ideas and souls, the avowed determinations of thought, arise 1 This is just a repetition of the former fallacy. Undetermined thought cannot give rise to determined thought. Either perfection springs out of imperfection, or imperfection out of perfection; and both are equally absurd according to the rigorous and clear definitions we have from Spinoza.

“The same fault comes out, namely, contradiction, if we consider God in reference to both thought, extension, and the modes. I am then a mode: * I am part and particle ’ (Emerson) of God; and therefore my own individuality is gone; I am absorbed in God’s nature; by abdicating my individual

SL Andrews. 2)1

character, my personal identity is entirely lost, and how can I say any longer I exist; I think I act, I afl&rni. Thus (as M. Saisset shows), in afl&rming God, Spinoza contradicts himself; ’ by distinguishing himself from Him, by placing himself in His presence as a real subject, as a thinking and living individuality.’ The pantheist cannot escape his contradictions, but he completes what was wanting in his system of contradictions. By a sweeping generalisation he boldly postulates for his own convenience and his system, the greatest of all contradictions; he speaks of ’ the principle of the identity of contradictories.’ Nothing and being are identical, so are the unit and zero. In the Hegelian language, ‘Sein = Nichts, — -i.e., being = nothing.’ Pantheism, after it has reached such absurdities as this, may truly be regarded as beyond the power of refutation; we cannot refute nothing. * It has taken away every link to connect it with common sense, with any human thought, or with any human language.’”

We leave this very able essay by quoting in full its concluding pages, — acute, clear, and eloquent: —

“We have now finished our examination of Spinoza’s philosophy. Many more objections might be urged, and much more said still against such a system, but it is enough that we have tried to show its chief and most evident defects. The faults we could easily find against a system that denies the liberty, and even the reality of the creature, would be endless, for a man who uses his liberty and employs his own reality as a being, to deny, what he acknowledges in using for that very denial, must necessarily involve himself in endless contradictions.

“It is a deplorable thing to see men who might have been truly great, coolly and coldly destroy part of their own nature and become a dialectical apparatus, a reasoning machine, without feeling and without even sense. It is a good thing that men such as Spinoza did not live as they thought and wrote, else the very world itself would be scandalised. ‘Thought,’ says Vinet, ‘may brutalise when separated from feeling, conscience, or evidence.’ Again, he says, ‘All the symbolisms in the world, all the efforts of the most vast intellectual powers, could never originate in the soul the least sentiment of justice and injustice, the least notion of duty. The intellect may fertilise this germ — indeed, this fertilisation cannot take place without the intellect; but the germ pre-exists.’ And yet the great intellectual powers and vast comprehensive mind of Spinoza did not perceive, or would not acknowledge this.

“The system of Spinoza is one complete whole: — so rigorously fixed is it that it cannot change in one point that is important without changing altogether. And men admire this system, and hold it up as an example of patience — of untiring investigation. Mr. Hunt, in his essay on Pantheism, — a very ordinary book we think, — hints at some comparison between Spinoza and ‘Him who was pre-eminently the teacher of religion to men.’ He aggrandises Spinoza, but never thinks of showing — as he might and ought to have done — the impious assumption and blasphemous declarations of this ‘God-intoxicated ’ man. It is a wicked comparison, — that of Spinoza and Christ. A man with any reverence for the Divinity and unapproachable holiness of Christ, the God-man, would never think of venturing even the thought of a likeness between the two. It painfully reveals to us the fact that pantheism has not been without its seductive, deceptive, and corrupting influences on Mr. Hunt’s mind. He talks of wisdom being justified in her children, asserts the rights of reason to be heard in matters where faith — faith in God — is alone of any use. Keason will assert her right to be heard in her views of the divinest mysteries. This is what is continually being harped upon in our ears by other men than Mr. Hunt; as if the soul of man had not er rights, and must also assert them; and that transcendently far above the reach of reason’s impious grasp. Then, if a word is said against these philosophers, we are told ’ adt, nauseam,’ that their whole life was a pursuit of and a devotion to truth. The search for truth becomes multitudinous in its variety of objects. All get the name of truth, however much the one may deny the other. What is truth? Is it not one and the same thing for ever and ever? It, and it alone, does not accommodate itself to man’s private convictions. Truth is made for man, and he cannot give it any shape he please. If he does, it is only a creation of his own fancy, and partakes no more of the real nature of truth than the shadow partakes of the essence of its substance. But we are told: ‘These men had their convictions.’ Yes, that is true; but every man must have his convictions tried by a rule which is outside of himself: our will cannot be the law of our will. Truth is not the ’ ego ’ of any man; it is something which is uncreated and independent in its existence, which nothing can bend into shape. ‘There are some faults slight in the sight of love, some errors slight in the estimate of wisdom, but truth forgives no insult, and endures no stain ’ (Ruskin). How many insults have been heaped, and stains given to man’s holiest feelings, truest aspirations, to all that is good and best in his nature, by these German transcend entalists. Fichte considered the whole external world the projection of a universal ego proceeding according to the self-evolving laws of the universal mind. Is this truth? and if it is, who can understand it 1 To what part of man’s nature does it address itself for apprehension? It is quite true that every man has his convictions, but whence came they? ‘Each one aspires to order his life upon convictions; hut if these convictions be only his will disguised, in what a vicious circle is he constrained to turn.’

“It was mournfully so with Spinoza, with him morality passed into intellect, mere notions, or the dimmest notions of ideas took the place of affections, and the mind supplanted the soul. The inner life was dried up; the functions of the soul were deadened, and not allowed to act, and the intellect was substituted in their place. True it is that Spinoza was a dupe of his own drama.’ Long-continued study of Spinoza’s philosophy has left us with strangely mingled thoughts, and still stranger feelings. We cannot admire, we cannot call him a truly great man, for he wanted the essential element of greatness. Was he humble? Historians say so, and yet he regarded humility as a weakness, and considered that of all the follies that ever entered into the minds of men, the folly of repentance was the greatest. Strange contradiction this, that a man should possess and exhibit that very quality which he despised. Eenan supplies us with a remarkable saying: * Great intellect knows no resipiscence, and high art has nothing to repent of.’

“Spinoza was very much of a Stoic in his own way. He regarded life with supreme indifference, and lived careless of consequences. Absolute scepticism led to the dissolution even of thought, as exclusive thought led to continued and confirmed moral indifferentism. Spinoza had nursed a stoical nature, peculiar in its kind, and not to be compared with the sublime Stoicism of these ’ seekers after God,’ Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, and Epictetus. His life is a beacon of warning to those who are tempted to go to utter wreck and ruin on the shoals of moral indifferentism.

“If man is to continue a religious being or a moral agent, and if he is all that already — then Spinoza’s philosophy is false, absolutely false. No man could worship Spinoza’s God; no man could rise to that communion which all earnest, truthful spirits long for and cherish. No man could love the metaphysical entity — lifeless — while it strangely possessed the power of extinguishing all life in the soul of man. No man can look forward to the so-called immortality which Spinoza provides for him, unless he desires annihilation; and that, we know, man will ever desire in vain. Repentance, and all the graces of humility — the beauty of self-denying love, and charity, of mercy and meekness — are banished from this system. No man could,

SL Andrews. 41

therefore, feel his lost estate, and the need of a Saviour, which is an uneradicable instinct in the heart of men.

“Spinoza speaks of Christ; but it is plain he does not regard Him as Christ, the only Son of the living God. Sadder shadows could hardly flit before our mind’s eye than do now; for they are shadows from the darkened and polluted sanctity of a man’s soul, which, had it been listened to, would have been the light of life. The damping breath of fride came upon the glass through which he saw darkly, and once for all completely darkened the glass. But the man no longer believed it to be dark; he thought he saw clearly through it. He was deceived. It was his own abstractions which he saw reflected in that glass, and he mistook them for what was now completely enveloped in eternal darkness beyond. The words of Schleiermacher can be appropriated by us. ‘He delighted to contemplate himself in the mirror of an eternal world, where, doubtless, he saw himself reflected as its most lovely image.’

“There is nothing so dangerous as knowledge, and the pride of knowledge, the efi“ects of which we have strikingly exemplified in Spinoza. ‘Twas knowledge brought sin into the world, or rather the imprudent desire of knowledge; and men, true to the disorders of their nature, are ever sinning the old Eve-sin again. What does the extreme and exclusive application of one’s mind to knowledge not do? It dispels that necessary sense of wonder which keeps down pride; that preciousness of childlike simplicity which is the characteristic of true greatness; it quenches in man the capacity for devotion, and silently though surely saps the strength of a man’s soul. That water which ripples round the boat sparkles in the dim light of an autumn evening with a phosphoric radiance, most wonderful and most lovely. Eagerly desirous, the boatman stretches out his hand to take some of the water in its palm, and discover for himself what this wonderful light can be. The water is in his hand, closely shut, and the treasure he believes to be contained within. But he opens his hand, and the subtile, mysterious light is no longer there. It is gone, and the water lies in the hollow of his hand colourless and wanting the beauty it had there on the open sea. The wonder is gone from it, and all the fine colour which it had when first he took it from the sea. In despair and disappointment he lets go the oars, and flings himself headlong into the glittering and crested waves, there to satiate his longing. Was it not thus with Spinoza? His monument was his tomb; — there he buried himself, where he expected life; but where all life was paralysed, and knowledge was no longer itself, but a delusive though dead imagination.”

“Every student’s name is legion]’ said Whitefield, speaking of the importance of college life. To get hold of a student is to get hold of one whose future life is likely to tell more upon the world than that of any other. The college responsibilities, both of students and professors, are thus beyond all calculation. Affection on the one side and reverence on the other have, in the case of many a missionary and minister, wrought wonders. Such a reciprocity of feeling cannot commence too early. Dr. Arnold’s power was one worth having, and a position like his was immensely responsible. Next to that of a Christian parent, the influence of a Christian teacher is immense. In the life of Bengel there is an interesting extract given from his travelling diary which may very suitably be quoted here, as containing hints for students and professors worthy of consideration: — “Dr. John William Bayer, Professor of Divinity at Altorf, holds private meetings of his students; at which he gives them select passages of Scripture to explain, and their expositions are finally enlarged and corrected by himself. As he disapproves of too strict a mode of education, he insists rather on such superintendence and admonition as shall not remit even during those youthful recreations which his own free and liberal disposition cheerfully allows.”

“Stolthe, of Jena, says, that piety is at a low ebb in Holland, because they have nothing of the Cross there. Election to grace, he said, is general; but election to glory, particular; and that the ninth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans is to be understood of the election to grace, not of the election to glory. That the merit of Christ is not the original moving cause of preventing grace. That tears should not be suppressed in the pulpit, as they will often speak to the hearts of some of the audience; and that ten persons at once had recently been first affected, and spiritually awakened by such simple means. Stolthe frequently recruits himself with bodily labour. He is very prudent, and never hastily puts confidence in any one.”

“Junker, of Altenburg, is a most kind man. He admires the regulations and methods at Halle. In teaching the classics, he says, we should carefully explain the peculiarities both of Latin and of German words, though it may take up much of the time; and that rapid reading is only useful to more advanced pupils. He construes first, and the pupils repeat after him. He delivers all his instructions in the vernacular tongue. He reads the Greek Testament through with his pupils in the course of a year, taking every occasion for practical observations and exhortations as he goes on. Pupils refusing to submit to order after two or three admonitions, are dismissed from the seminary, that he may have no occasion for any severer discipline.”

“Pritius, of Frankfort, observed, that all successful education of young persons depends quite as much on attending to the proper direction of their will as on cultivation of the understanding. He speaks highly of the writings of Poiret, as leading the mind so directly to God; and recommends Spener’s ‘Advices.’”

“Tennhardt received me very kindly. He is moderate and abstemious; mortifies the flesh, and is much concerned for the health of his soul. He cordially hates every false way.”

“Breithaupt, of Halle, is inclined to regard it as one of the signs of ’ the last time,’ that the present generation cheats itself with the notion of its own excellence, dreams of being on the point of enjoying the very best condition, and regards the ancients as no better than old women in comparison with itself. These, he says, were just the thoughts that men had of themselves immediately before the deluge; but as ‘God is not mocked,’ so He is not to be imposed on by such thoughts as these.”

The paternal care exercised by these continental professors of the last century is all the more remarkable, because religious declension, both in life and doctrine, had already set in, all over Europe, in the early days of that illustrious scholar. Bengel’s affection for his pupils was not in vain; and it is touching to find him, in one of his letters, telling his correspondent that he preferred correspondence with his old students to that of the literary men of his time. The chapter in his Memoirs on “Bengel as Tutor of a Theological Seminary,” is specially full of interest and instruction. Some tutors have spent their strength in perverting the faith and undermining the religion of their favourite pupils. Bengel is a fine specimen not only of a thorough teacher, but of an experienced spiritual director; of one who knew his students well; who won their confidence; who drew them to himself by Christian affability and tenderness; who sought them out in their struggles and perplexities; who bore with them in all their frowardness; who not only made them scholars and critics, but who pointed them daily to the one Cross, and led them to the one Teacher and the one Comforter; who instructed them with wonderful power and sagacity in the knowledge of the one Book.*

I am, however, anticipating somewhat. The St. Andrews work was preliminary. Theological study was to begin in Edinburgh.

* The following paragraph gives us a specimen of the man and his mode of teaching: — “In Greek, I employ set times for their recollecting and clearly comprehending the paradigms and grammatical rules. We go through the Greek Testament in two years, during the first months of which I require the text to be translated quite literally; but afterwards, when I find we can get ’ on quicker and with more confidence, I let them read off sentence by sentence into Latin. The more important passages are learnt by heart. To increase our {copia verborum) stock of words, I conduct them through Leusden. After the whole course of these Greek Testament lectures is completed, I lecture with them upon Chrysostom’s Treatise on the Priesthood; recommending to the more advanced pupils, Nonnus’s ‘Paraphrase of St. John’s Gospel;’ and ‘Macarius.’”