and the work is a substantial contribution towards the settlement of an important practical question. MARINER NEWMAN. A voyage in the Good Ship, Glad Tidings, to the Promised Land. By DUNCAN MACGREGOR. London: Hodder and Stroughton, 27, Paternoster Row. 1877. MR. MACGREGOR is favourably known to a large circle of readers as the writer of "Silver Spray," and several other series of ingenious and attractive stories. He has now issued a larger and more elaborate work, which will certainly be not. less appreciated than the smaller productions of his facile pen. "Mariner Newman" inevitably reminds us of another and greater work. The prince of allegorists has immortalized one world-wide conception of the Christian life, and all attempts to supplement the" Pilgrim's Progress" would be equally vain and presumptuous. But the related image of the Christian life as a voyage has not yet been embodied in a work of similar scope and corresponding worth; and, so far as we know, Mr. Macgregor's is the most thorough and successful attempt which has been made in this direction. The main idea of the book, as suggested by the titlepage, is worked out with fidelity and skill. The imagery throughout is well sustained, and there is an absence of the over-straining which in so many cases mars even good writing of this class. The author has what is, in fact, indispensable for his task, a prolific imagination, regulated by a sound and vigorous judgment, and shrewd common sense. He has a clear grasp of the great truths of the Gospel, depicts in plain and telling words the way of Salvation, and brings home to the hearts and consciences of his readers the realities of eternal life and death. He is admirably conversant with nautical operations and phrases, and turns his knowledge to the highest account in his portraiture of the beginning and the progress, the sorrows and the joys, the temptations and the encouragements of the Christian life. The characters are, as a rule, sketched with great force, and the record of their varied experience will awaken a responsive echo in the hearts of other voyagers. We have little doubt that "Mariner Newman will become a general favourite, and trust that under his genial command not a few will be induced to undertake a voyage in the good ship, Glad Tidings. THE SYMBOLIC PARABLES OF THE CHURCH, THE World, and THE ANTICHRIST. Being the Separate Predictions of the Apocalypse, viewed in their relation to the General Truths of Scripture. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 38, George-street. 1877. THE author of this treatise has made an attempt to interpret Scripture by Scripture. He believes that we have in the Bible itself ample materials for the formation of an intelligent estimate of the general design and meaning of the sublime and mysterious book which closes the Sacred Canon. He holds that the revelations given to the Apostle run in three great lines or divisions. The Septenary of the Seals unfolding the providence of God towards His Church, or a parabolic history of Christ's Kingdom; the Septenary of the Trumpets unfolding the same providence towards the world, or the Kingdoms of the Earth; while the Septenary of the Vials unfold it in the case of a counterfeit church, the greatest foe of the true Church, and, therefore, Anti-Christ. All other visions he regards as supplementary. His theory and interpretation are sustained by considerations of great weight, and in several instances we prefer his exposition to any with which we are acquainted. The meaning of the Apocalypse has been, and still is, so keenly discussed that agreement upon it seems almost beyond the limits of hope. Every such contribution as this should, however, be welcomed, as it will suggest much even to those who cannot endorse its fundamental position. The author is a little too hard in his censure of the investigations of learned men, and certainly does not answer all the objections which have been urged against theories similar to his own. But, for the most part, he writes with clear spiritual discernment and sound. sense, while his doctrinal views are decidedly and fervently evangelical. 431 he and his wife were hurried into eternity in the Ashtabula accident on the Pacific railway, impart a painful interest to these memoirs. We thank Mr. Guest, of Gravesend, who is the editor of this English edition, for his very successful share in the production of this work. GRACE MAGNIFIED IN THE LIFE A MEMORIAL address by Mr. by the father of the young man, Howieson, and a biographical sketch whose piety is the worthy subject of this record, and which will, we hope, be blessed to many youthful readers. We strongly recommend it to the leaders of our Bible Classes and Senior Sabbath School Classes. FOR THE DEAR LORD'S SAKE: A AND a very pretty and natural story it is. If it is not true, it ought to be, but our belief is that it records actual occurrences under feigned names. The author has descriptive power of no ordinary character. P. P. BLISS, HIS LIFE AND LIFE WORK. London : Morgan & Scott, 12, Paternoster Buildings. THE author of "Hold the Fort," and, indeed, of most of the hymns used by Moody and Sankey, was a man of rare Christian excellence. The appalling circumstances in which THE VEIL LIFTED FROM ISRAEL: THERE is a good deal in this brochure with which we cordially sympathise, but we must frankly confess that we have never been able to assent to one of its main positions, viz., that "the English nation (is) of the house of Joseph, for the most part descended from Ephraim." The position is entirely without proof, and would never, we think, have been thought of apart from the exigencies of a peculiar theory. We can appeal to the Jews to believe in Jesus as the Christ, and to Christians to pray and labour for their conversion on other and Holyoake, Rev. T. H. (Brompton), Spanish Town, Jamaica. Raws, Rev. J. G. (Rawdon College) Kimbolton. Williams, Rev. W. (Clay Cross) Upton Chapel, Lambeth. THE BAPTIST MAGAZINE. OCTOBER, 1877. Contemporary Preachers. X. THE REV. HENRY PARRY LIDDON, D.D. THE Cathete of the great national structure familiarly THE "Ecclesia Cathedralis Sancti Pauli Londinensis,"-to quote known as "St. Paul's," has been described by its latest historian as "in its own style of architecture the noblest church in Christian Europe; the masterpiece of our Great British architect, Sir Christopher Wren; the glory-it should be the pride-of the City of London, of the Christian people of the realm." Dean Milman's judgment of its merits and of its claims to our veneration may, however, display an excusable partiality, and both on aesthetic and religious grounds we may be unable to yield to it an unreserved assent. attempt a comparison between St. Paul's and Westminster Abbey, nor We will not here weigh the Dean's estimate from what might be considered a Nonconformist or a Puritan standpoint. But it will be universally allowed that a building can only become the glory of a nation when it fulfils the highest end for which it has been erected, and is more than a masterpiece of architectural skill. St. Paul's is no doubt an admirable Valhalla for our English worthies, and on this ground it gathers around it the strongest sentiments of patriotism, but it was not for this it was erected, and so long as great building" was applied to its acknowledged purposes-the worship one narrow part alone of this of God and the instruction of the people-it certainly could not on religious grounds claim to be our glory. It was a happy thought when in 1858 the Archbishop of Canterbury, at that time Bishop of London, suggested that the Cathedral should in some way be used for special evening services, such as might attract the large masses of the people who could not be reached by the ordinary services of the Church. The Dean and Chapter heartily approved of the suggestion. Improvements in the building were at once commenced. It was adapted for public worship on a larger and more comprehensive scale, and immense congregations, justifying all that had been done, were gathered. The services under the dome of St. Paul's are now an established part of its worship, and with similar efforts in other places have greatly increased the hold which the English Church has gained on the affections of large numbers of the people. The stately Cathedral has shown itself more worthy of the days when from St. Paul's Cross, as the most prominent pulpit in England, the early Reformers sought to enlighten and influence the public mind by proclaiming in their simplicity the grand truths of the gospel, in opposition to the degrading superstitions and the semiheathenish ceremonies of Rome. And among the preachers who have shed new lustre on St. Paul's, although he is not so faithful a disciple of the Reformers as we could wish, is the Rev. Henry Parry Liddon, the most distinguished of its clergy" and in popular estimation its Canon par excellence. He is perhaps not so profound a scholar, so fine an expositor, or so massive a reasoner as Canon Lightfoot, but he has gifts which qualify him for a more conspicuous public position, and procure him an almost unrivalled influence in the pulpit. During the months in which he is in residence, the Cathedral every Sunday afternoon is thronged by the largest congregation which assembles in the metropolis, the whole of the vast area being, as a rule, occupied. The Cathedral pulpit affords a vantage ground quite exceptional in its nature,and such as would enable even a preacher of average abilities to command a hearing. Among the multitudes who eagerly flock to St. Paul's are many who would not enter an ordinary church, and as a simple " parish priest" Dr. Liddon's name would not exert so subtle an attraction. But all adventitiousaids apart, he could not be other than a popular preacher, and would claim rank with the very foremost of our time. His career as a student of Christ Church, Oxford, was brilliant, and gave promise of future eminence. He graduated as B.A. in 1850, gained the Johnson Theological Scholarship in 1851, and took his M.A. in 1852. In 1854 he was appointed to the Vice-Principalship of the Theological College, Cuddesdon, and retained the office until 1859. He was for some years Examining Chaplain to the late Bishop of Salisbury-Dr. Walter Kerr Hamilton-a brief sketch of whose life he wrote for The Guardian, and has since issued in an enlarged form In 1864 he was made a Prebendary of Salisbury; and having frequently been "University Preacher," he was called upon "at a very short notice," in consequence of the illness of the clergyman who the University had previously chosen, to deliver the Bampton lectures for 1866. He subsequently became Ireland Professor of Ex gesis in the University of Oxford, and in 1870 was made a Canon of St. Paul's. Apart from the prominence which he has acquired as a preacher, |