Chapter VI: In Blue-Anchor Lane (1)

Nine o'clock was striking, as I hurried along the footway of London Bridge, hustled and jostled by the many passengers who seem to be forever treading their weary road of business, care, or pleasure--for even pleasure brings its toil; nine o'clock resounding loud and clear in the night-air from the dome of St. Paul's, and echoed from the neighboring church-steeples. It sounds romantic enough to please the most enthusiastic devourers of pre-Radcliffe novels, or to capture the imagination of the most ardent votaries of fiction. But it was far otherwise to me on the night of that Thursday which had seen Hugh Atherton branded with the name of murderer. It was far otherwise to me--weighed down with the crushing knowledge that the companion of my youth, the friend of my later years, although an innocent man, was being gradually hurried on to a felon's death; and that I--_I_ who loved him so well--had helped to his destruction, though Heaven could witness how unwillingly and unconsciously. No; there was no romance for me that night as I dragged my weary steps over the bridge, with the sight of him before my eyes, and the sound of heart-bursting grief from the lips of that poor stricken girl, his betrothed bride, ringing in my ears; for I had been to tell her the results of this day's work. Oh! why had I not yielded to his wish the evening I met Hugh Atherton in that fatal street, and taken him home with me? Why had I not more earnestly followed up the impulse--nay, dare I not call it inspiration?--to return after him and bid him come back with me? Ah me! my selfishness, my blindness--could any remorse ever atone for them and the terrible evil they had brought about? My God, thou knowest how my heart cried out to thee then in bitterness and sorrow: "Smite me with thy righteous judgments; but spare him--spare her!"

And now what new scene in this drama of life was I going to see unfolded? I could not tell; I knew nothing; I could only pray that if Providence pointed out to me any track by which I might penetrate the awful mystery that hung round us, I might pursue it with all fidelity, with utter forgetfulness of self. I had gone with Merrivale after we left Wimpole street to the House of Detention where Atherton was lodged, and desired him to ask that I should see Hugh; but he had come out looking puzzled and perplexed, and said: "I can't make it out; Atherton refuses to see you, and gives no reason except that it is 'best not.'" No help was there, then, but to trust to time and unwearied exertion to remove the cloud between us.

I found Jones waiting for me at the other end of the bridge, and anxiously on the look-out.

"I am right glad to see you, sir; I was fearful you mightn't come, seeing that I gave you no reason for doing so."

"I trusted you sufficiently, Jones, to belive you wouldn't have brought me on a useless errand at such a time of awful anxiety."

"Bless you, sir, I wouldn't--not for a thousand pounds; and I've had that offered to me in my day by parties as wished to get rid of me or shut me up. No, indeed, sir; I'd not add to your trouble if so be I could not lighten it. But we have no time to lose, and we have a goodish bit before us. You asked me this morning whether I knew any thing of a Mr. de Vos. I did not then, but I do now; and a strange chance threw me across him. If, sir, you will trust yourself entirely to me to-night, I think I can be of use to you. But you must confide in me, and allow me to take the lead in everything. And first, will you let me ask you one or two questions?"

I told him he might ask anything he pleased; if I could not answer, I would tell him so; that I would trust him implicitly.

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"Then, sir, will you condescend to honor me by coming home first for a few minutes? My missus expects us. She's in a terrible way about Mr. Atherton: she never forgets past kindness."

We turned off the bridge, straight down Wellington street, High street Borough, and then into King street, where Jones stopped before a respectable-looking private house, and knocked. The door was opened by his wife--with whom, under other circumstances, I had been acquainted before--and we entered their neat little front-parlor. Evidently we were expected, for supper was laid--homely, but substantial, and temptingly clean.

"You must excuse us, sir," said Jones; "but I fancied it was likely you had taken little enough to-day, and I told Jane to have something ready for us. Please to eat, Mr. Kavanagh; we have a short journey before us, and I want you to have all your wits and energies about you."

I was faint and sick, true enough; for I had touched nothing save a biscuit and a glass of wine since the morning; but my stomach seemed to loathe food; and though I drew to the table, not wishing to offend the good people, I felt as if to swallow a morsel would choke me. Jones cut up the cold ham and chicken in approved style, whilst his wife busied herself with slicing off thin rounds of bread and butter; but I toyed with my knife and fork, and could not eat. Not so Jones; he took down incredible quantities of all that was before him with the zest of a man who knows he is going to achieve luck's victory. Presently he threw down his tools, and looked hard at me.

"This'll never do, sir; you _must_ eat."

I shook my head and smiled.

"Jane," said he to his wife, "bring out Black Peter; no one ever needed him more than Mr. Kavanagh."

Mrs. Jones opened a cupboard and brought forth a tapery-necked bottle, out of which her husband very carefully poured some liquid into a wineglass, and then as carefully corked it up again.

"Drink this, sir; I've never known it to fail yet."

I lifted the glass to my lips. "Why, it's the primest Curaçoa!" I cried.

"That it may be, sir, for all I know. A poor German, to whom I once rendered a service, sent me two bottles, and I've found it the best cordial I ever tasted. I call it Black Peter--his name was Peter, and he was uncommonly black, to be sure--but I never heard its right name before. Drink it off, sir, and you'll feel a world better presently."

I did, and the effects were as Jones prognosticated. The cold, sick shivering left me, and I was able in a little while to take some food.

"Now, Jane," said the good man to his wife, when he saw I was getting on all right, "shut up your ears; Mr. Kavanagh and I are going to talk business."

Mrs. Jones laughed, picked up some needle-work, and sat down to a small table by the fire.

"My wife's a true woman, sir, in every thing but her tongue; she _don't_ talk: I'll back her against Sir Richard himself for keeping dark on a secret case. Now, sir, will you please to tell me, if you can, why you are anxious to find out about this Mr. de Vos?"

I related to him about my meeting De Vos at my sister's, what I had heard and witnessed in Swain's Lane, the impressions made upon me then, and how I had caught sight of the man outside the police-court on the preceding day. Jones listened very attentively, and made notes of it all.

"Exactly," said he, when I ended by saying that Mr. Wilmot had denied all knowledge of De Vos and the rendezvous in Swain's Lane. "Just what I expected. Of course he would."

"What! Do you think he did know, and that it was Wilmot's voice I heard?"

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"I think nothing, sir" said be, with a curious smile; "but I guess a good deal. We have a terribly-tangled skein to unravel; but I think in following up this man we have got the right end of it. I must now tell you how I stumbled upon him to-day. I heard from inspector Keene that he was engaged by Mr. Merrivale to see into this murder of old Mr. Thorneley; and knowing how partial I was to Mr. Atherton--good reason too--he asked me if I'd like to help him, and if so, he'd speak about me to Sir Richard Mayne. I said I would, above all things, for I'd had a hand in taking him, though I believed he was innocent; and now I'd give much to help him back to his liberty again. To cut short with the story, it was settled I should hang about the house to-day during the inquest in disguise, to pick up any stray information that might be let drop; for there's a deal more known, sir, about rich folks and their households by such people as those who were crowded round the house today than ever you'd think for; and we gather much of our most valuable information by mixing in these crowds unknown, and listening to the casual gossip that goes on in them. So I made myself up into a decent old guy, and took my way to Wimpole street. Whilst waiting to cross Oxford street two men came up behind me, and I heard a few words drop which made me turn round to look at them. Sure enough, one answered most perfectly your description of this Mr. De Vos. I thought to myself, 'Here's game worth following;' and I did follow, and heard them make an appointment for to-night on this side the water. Now, sir, do you see why I asked you to meet me?'

"I do. We must be present at the meeting."

"Just so, sir; and we have no time to lose, for the hour mentioned was soon after ten o'clock. If you'll take nothing else we will go. We must go made up; and you'll trust entirely to me."

"You mean disguised?"

"I do, sir; if you'll come up-stairs, I'll give you what is necessary."

Up-stairs we went, and Jones produced from a chest of drawers a rough common seaman's jacket, a pair of duck trowsers, a woollen comforter, a tarpaulin hat, and a false black beard, in which he rigged me out; and then proceeded to make similar change in his own attire, with the exception of a wig of shaggy red hair and a pair of whiskers to match.

"Leave your watch, sir, and any little articles of jewelry you may have about you, in my wife's charge; keep your hat well slouched over your face and your hands in your pockets, give a swing and swagger to your walk, and you'll do."

"Why, where upon earth are we going, Jones?"

"To Blue-Anchor Lane, sir, if you know where that very fashionable quarter lies."

I did not know exactly where it was, saying from police-reports, which named it as one of the lowest parts of that low district lying between Bermondsey and Rotherhithe. I had been somewhere near it once, having occasion to call on one of the clergy belonging to the Catholic Church in Parker's Row; but that was quite an aristocratic part, for a wonder, compared with Blue-Anchor Lane. Yes, Parker's Row I had visited; and, thanks to my having grown and "gentlefolked" to the height of six feet odd, I had managed to pull the bell and get admitted to the convent behind the church, where dwell the good Sisters of Mercy, walled-in all tight and trim. But down Blue-Anchor Lane I had never penetrated; and I asked Jones if it were not considered a favorite haunt for characters of the worst description.

"It is so, sir; and we must be careful and cautious to-night in all we do." I noticed that he put his staff and alarum in his pocket, and furnished me with similar implements. "In case of necessity, sir," he said, {614} laughing, "you must act as special constable with me. I wouldn't take you into the smallest danger; but, you see, I don't know but what your presence is of absolute necessity, and that you may be able to gather a clue in this case quicker than I should. Not that I yield in quickness at twigging most things to any man," said Detective Jones, with a bit of professional pride quite pardonable; "but you must identify the man for certain yourself, sir, before I can act in the matter with anything like satisfaction."

It was just upon ten o'clock when we left King street, and proceeded to London Bridge; whence we took the train to Spa Road. It takes, as every one knows, but a few minutes in the transit; and leaving that dark, dismal, break-neck hole of a station, we turned to the left up Spa Road, down Jamaica Row, and so into Blue-Anchor Lane. It is needless to describe what that place is at night; it is needless to picture in words all the degrading vice that walks forth unmasked in some of the streets of this capital, which ranks so high amidst the great cities o the world. Is our exterior morality to be so far behind, so infinitely below, that of tribes and nations on whom we stoop to trample? Can such things be, and we not waken from our lethargic sleep, remembering what our account will one day be? Can our rulers so calmly eat and drink, take their pleasure, hunt their game, pursue their gentlemanlike sports, knowing, as assuredly they do too well, that thousands of their people are living lives more degraded, more brutal, more shamelessly inhuman, more full of sin, ignorance, and every kind of squalor and misery, than the wildest savages we have set our soldiers to hunt out of the lands in which God placed them?

"What can the man be doing in such a place as this?" I whispered to Jones, as he stopped before the door of a small low-looking house of entertainment, half coffee-shop and half public-house, that rejoiced in the name of "Noah's Ark."

"That's just what we've got to find out, sir. Somehow it strikes me he's better acquainted with such haunts as these than you and I are with Regent street or Piccadilly. If I haven't seen his face before, and that not ten yards from the Old Bailey, I'm blest if I was ever more mistaken in my life. But hush! here he is."

And swaggering along, with his hat stuck on one side, and murmuring a verse of "Rory O'Moore," came Mr. de Vos, my sister Elinor's "treasure-trove," evidently somewhat airy in the upper regions, and elated by good cheer. Jones had taken out a short clay pipe, and whilst seemingly intent on filling it I saw he was watching De Vos with a keen observant glance. The latter gentleman was far from being intoxicated; he was merely what is called "elevated," and quite wide awake enough to be wary of anything going on around him. I saw him start perceptibly as his eye fell upon me, though my slouched hat and high collar must have gone a good way toward concealing my features.

"Fine night, mate," said Jones in a bluff, loud voice, lighting and pulling vigorously at his pipe.

"Deed and it is so," answered De Vos, halting just opposite to us, and once more turning his scrutiny upon me. "Are you game for a dhrop of whiskey?" addressing himself especially to me.

I was about to answer in feigned tones, when Jones took the word out of my mouth, and replied: "No use asking him--he's too love-sick just now to care for drink; he's parted with his sweetheart, and is off for the West-Indies by five in the morning from the Docks."

Something now seemed to attract De Vos's attention to Jones, for he became suddenly very grave.

"I've not seen you here before," said he, peering into the detective's face.

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"May be you have, may be you haven't. I don't need to ask any man's leave to drink a pint at 'Noah's Ark,' and watch a game of skittles."

This, as Jones told me afterward, was quite a random shot; however, it took effect.

"I believe you," said De Vos with all the boastfulness of his nature. "You'll not see a betther bowler through the country entirely than meself. I'll back the odds against any man this side the Channel, and bedad to it. I dare say now it's here on Monday last you were to see me play?"

"Ay, ay, mate," sang out Jones; "right enough."

"Ah! thin it was small shiners I went in for then; but I'll lay a couple of fivers now against a brad, and play you fair to-morrow against any of them in there," with a back-handed wave to the house, whence unmistakable sounds of noisy mirth were proceeding. "Is it done?"

"I'll consider your offer--shiver my timbers but I will!" said Jones, with a burst of Jack-tar-ism--"and let you know in the morning."

"Just as you please; you pays your money and you takes your choice;" and nodding to Jones, who responded to the salute in approved style, De Vos passed into the tap-room of the "Ark."

"Is it he?" hurriedly whispered Jones when he was out of hearing.

"Yes, without doubt," answered I, in the same tones.

"Then follow me, sir; and keep silent unless I speak to you;" and we likewise entered through the swing-doors of the gayly-lighted bar.

A glance sufficed to show us that the man we sought was not there; but Jones was far from being disconcerted; indeed he seemed most thoroughly up to the mark in the task before him, and threw himself into the part he had assigned himself with all the genius and facility of a Billington or Toole. Three or four men with physiognomies that would not have disgraced the hangman's rope were drinking, smoking, and exchanging low _badinage_ with a flashy-looking young woman, who stood behind the bar-counter. Woman, did I say? Angels pity her! There was little of womanly nature left in the fierce glitter of her eyes, in the hard lines of premature age which dissipation and sin and woe had left carved upon her forehead and around her mouth. Little enough of this though, no doubt, thought Detective Jones, intent upon his own purposes, as he quickly made up to her, and asked with all the swaggering audacity of a "jolly tar," for two stiff glasses of the primest pine-apple rum-and-water.

Jones extracted a long clay pipe from the lot standing before us in a broken glass, and passed it to me, and handed his pouch of tobacco, with an expressive glance that told me I was to smoke. Whilst filling the pipe and lighting it, the woman returned with the rum-and-water, which she placed ungraciously before us with a bang and clatter that caused the liquid to spill out of the glasses.

"Look here, miss," said Jones in his most insinuating tones; "I'll forgive you for upsetting the grog, and give you five bob to buy a blue ribbon for your pretty hair, if you'll manage to get me and my mate a snug comer inside there," pointing to a door on the left, whence issued voices; "for we've a bit of money business to settle to-night, and he's off first thing in the morning for the Indies."

The woman seemed to hesitate for a moment, and then holding out her hand for the promised tip, she beckoned us to pass inside the bar, and led the way to the door. Before she opened it she said in a low voice:

"I am doing as much as my place is worth; but I want the money; take the table in the corner at the top here; keep yourselves quiet, and don't take no notice of nobody, least of all of him who'll be next you."

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She now opened the door, and I saw Jones slip some more money into her hand, which she received with a short grunt and a nod, and then closed the door upon us.

The room was divided like that of an ordinary coffee-shop into box compartments; the one in the right-hand corner by the door was empty, and we entered it, carrying our glasses and pipes with us. We seated ourselves at the end of the two benches opposite each other, and then glanced round. In the box _vis-à-vis_ were two rough-looking fellows, whom I took to be real followers of our pretended calling--the sea. They returned our gaze suspiciously enough, and we could hear one whisper to the other, "Who's them coves?" and the answer "Dunno; none of _us_." But the next moment my attention was diverted to the voices in the box next to ours.

"Did you see _her_?" It was De Vos who spoke, I felt sure.

"Not I, my God! not I," answered a deep hoarse voice. "It's ten years since she and I met, and I'd go to my grave sooner than we should meet again. Mind you, the day when her cold cruel eyes rest on me will be a fatal day for me. Faugh! I've passed through as much bloodshed as it's ever given one man to encounter in his life, and never flinched; but I tell you, Sullivan, the thought of meeting her face to face seems to freeze the life-blood of my heart."

"Do you think she had a hand in this, O'Brian?"

"Who can tell? She did not pause once; what should stop her again?"

"The fear of you."

"She sees no reason to fear. She believes I'm still over _there_, where she sent me."

"And the young fellow, _my_ man, does he know anything?"

"Again how can I tell? But I should say not. How could _she_ enlighten _him_?"

"Then he is--"

"Their son."

A pause succeeded. Meanwhile Jones had engaged in a sort of dumb-show with me to throw the men opposite off the scent, by passing papers and money backwards and forwards, and apparently making calculations with his pencil; in reality I saw he was taking notes. Presently De Vos spoke again.

"Well, let's drink to the heir, old boy; and so long as I can make him play the piper, why thin it's myself that will, and bedad to him."

His Irishisms, be it observed, were intermittent.

"Long life to the heir!" cried the two voices simultaneously; and there was a clash of glasses.

"What's the time of day by your ticker?" asked De Vos a few moments afterward.

"Just upon eleven. The lad was to be here by then, wasn't he?"

"Yes, by eleven. I'd like to know what he wants with me now."

Jones here took up his cap, buttoned his coat, quietly opened the door, and went out; I following him, of course. He threw a good-humored nod to the woman, who still stood behind the bar, and I did the same; but he never spoke until we were some yards from "Noah's ark."

"You may be thankful, sir," he then said in a low voice, "to have got out safely and unmolested. That's the worst haunt of some of the worst characters in London; and they're banded together so as to shut out every one as don't belong to them. There's been a Providence, sir, in it all," raising his cap, "depend upon it. Now we must see if we can stop this lad whom they are expecting. We'll talk the matter over afterward."

Just then a boy came up running at full speed.

"Halt!" cried Jones, laying his hand on the lad's shoulder. "What makes you so late?"

"What's the odds to you? Let me go," replied the boy, with a mixture of impudence and cunning in his face. "I'm not not bound for you."

"You're bound for 'Noah's Ark,' though."

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"Are you Mr. Sullivan?"

"Of course I am."

"Oh! then here's the letter, and you're to see if it's all right."

"All right," said Detective Jones, opening the note and glancing at its contents; "tell the gentleman I'll be there. Here's for you, young Codlings," dropping a half-crown into the boy's hand.

"Five shillings, and not a stiver less, is my fare."

"Here you are then, you small imp of iniquity;" and another coin of similar value found its way into the ragamuffin's pocket.

He cut a caper, turned head over heels, and was gone.

And now Jones tore on breathlessly till we were safe out of Blue-Anchor Lane and had reached Paradise Row, where a policeman was standing at the corner. Jones took him aside for a minute, and then rejoined me.

"We'll hail the first cab, sir, in Spa Road, and drive to your home, if you've no objection."

This we did; and as soon as we had started he took a small candle-lantern from his pocket, lit it, and then handed me the note to read which he had taken from the boy. It contained but few words; no names used, no address, no signature, and simply desired the person addressed to meet the writer the following day at the usual place and hour. What clue was there in that to the dark mystery we were bent on solving? Only this, and I put it into words:

"Great heavens! it is Lister Wilmot's handwriting!"

TO BE CONTINUED.

------

[ORIGINAL.]

THE MARTYR.

Serene above the world he stands,
Uplift to heaven on wings of prayer:
Across his breast his folded hands
Recall the cross he loved to bear.

Upon his upturned brow the light
Flows like the smile of God: he sees
A flash of wings that daze his sight,
He hears seraphic melodies.

In vain the cruel crowd may roar,
In vain the cruel flames may hiss:
Like seas that lash a distant shore,
They faintly pierce his sphering bliss.

He hears them, and he does not hear--
His fleshly bonds are loosened all--
No earthly sound can claim the ear
That listens for his Father's call.

It comes--and swift the spirit spurns,
His quivering lips and soars away;
The blind crowd roars, the blind fire burns,
While God receives their fancied prey.

D. A. C.

------

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From The Month.

ECCE HOMO. [Footnote 131]

[Footnote 131: "Ecce homo." A Survey of the Life and Work of Jesus
Christ. Macmillan. 1866.]

[The London _Reader_ says the following article is from the pen of
the Very Rev. Dr. Newman.--Ed. C.W.]

The word "remarkable" has been so hacked of late in theological criticism--nearly as much so as "earnest" and "thoughtful"--that we do not like to make use of it on the present occasion without an apology. In truth, it presents itself as a very convenient epithet, whenever we do not like to commit ourselves to any definite judgment on a subject before us, and prefer to spread over it a broad neutral tint to painting it distinctly white, red, or black. A man, or his work, or his deed, is "remarkable" when he produces an effect; be he effective for good or for evil, for truth or for falsehood--a point which, as far as that expression goes, we leave it for others or for the future to determine. Accordingly it is just the word to use in the instance of a volume in which what is trite and what is novel, what is striking and what is startling, what is sound and what is untrustworthy, what is deep and what is shallow, are so mixed up together, or at least so vaguely suggested, or so perplexingly confessed, which has so much of occasional force, of circumambient glitter, of pretence and of seriousness, as to make it impossible either with a good conscience to praise it, or without harshness and unfairness to condemn. Such a book is at least likely to be effective, whatever else it is or is not; and if it is effective, it may be safely called remarkable, and therefore we apply the epithet "remarkable" to this "Ecce Homo."

It is remarkable, then, on account of the sensation which it has made in religious circles. In the course of a few months it has reached a third edition, though it is a fair-sized octavo and not an over-cheap one. And it has received the praise of critics and reviewers of very distinct shades of opinion. Such a reception must be owing either to the book itself or to the circumstances of the day in which it has appeared, or to both of these causes together. Or, as seems to be the case, the needs of the day have become a call for some such work; and the work, on its appearance, has been thankfully welcomed, on account of its professed object, by those whose needs called for it. The author includes himself in the number of these; and, while providing for his own wants, he has ministered to theirs. This is what we especially mean by calling his book "remarkable."

Disputants may maintain, if they please, that religious doubt is our natural, our normal state; that to cherish doubts is our duty that to complain of them is impatience; that to dread them is cowardice; that to overcome them is inveracity; that it is even a happy state, a state of calm philosophic enjoyment, to be conscious of them--but after all, necessary or not, such a state is not natural, and not happy, if the voice of mankind is to decide the question. English minds, in particular, have too much of a religious temper in them, as a natural gift, to acquiesce for any long time in positive, active doubt. For doubt and devotion are incompatible with each other; every doubt, be it greater or less, stronger or weaker, involuntary as well as voluntary, acts upon {619} devotion, so far forth, as water sprinkled, or dashed, or poured out upon a flame, Real and proper doubt kills faith, and devotion with it; and even involuntary or half-deliberate doubt, though it does not actually kill faith, goes far to kill devotion; and religion without devotion is little better than a burden, and soon becomes a superstition. Since, then, this is a day of objection and of doubt about the intellectual basis of revealed truth, it follows that there is a great deal of secret discomfort and distress in the religions portion of the community, the result of that general curiosity in speculation and inquiry which has been the growth among us of the last twenty or thirty years.

The people of this country, being Protestants, appeal to Scripture, when a religious question arises, as their ultimate informant and decisive authority in all such matters; but who is to decide for them the previous question, that Scripture is really such an authority? When, then, as at this time, its divine authority is the very point to be determined, that is, the character and extent of its inspiration and its component parts, then they find themselves at sea, without possessing any power over the direction of their course. Doubting about the authority of Scripture, they doubt about its substantial truth; doubting about its truth, they have doubts concerning the objects which it sets before their faith, about the historical accuracy and objective reality of the picture which it presents to us of our Lord. We are not speaking of wilful doubting but of those painful misgivings, greater or less, to which we have already alluded. Religious Protestants, when they think calmly on the subject, can hardly conceal from themselves that they have a house without logical foundations, which contrives indeed for the present to stand, but which may go any day--and where are they then?

Of course Catholics will tell them to receive the canon of Scripture on the authority of the church, in the spirit of St. Augustine's well-known words: "I should not believe the gospel, were I not moved by the authority of the Catholic Church." But who, they ask, is to be voucher in turn for the church and St. Augustine? is it not as difficult to prove the authority of the church and her doctors as the authority of the Scriptures? We Catholics answer, and with reason, in the negative; but, since they cannot be brought to agree with us here, what argumentative ground is open to them? Thus they seem drifting, slowly perhaps, but surely, in the direction of scepticism.

It is under these circumstances that they are invited, in the volume before us, to betake themselves to the contemplation of our Lord's character, as it is recorded by the evangelists, as carrying with it its own evidence, dispensing with extrinsic proof, and claiming authoritatively by itself the faith and devotion of all to whom it is presented. Such an argument, of course, is as old as Christianity itself; the young man in the Gospel calls our Lord "Good Master," and St. Peter introduces him to the first Gentile converts as one who "went about doing good;" and in these last times we can refer to the testimony even of unbelievers in behalf of an argument as simple as it is constraining. "Si la vie et la mort de Socrate sont d'un sage," says Rousseau, "la vie et la mort de Jésus sont d'un Dieu." And he clenches the argument by observing, that, were the picture a mere conception of the sacred writers, "l'inventeur en serait plus étonnant que le héros." Its especial force lies in its directness; it comes to the point at once, and concentrates in itself evidence, doctrine, and devotion. In theological language, it is the _motivum credibilitatis_, the _objectum materiale_ and the _formale_, all in one; it unites human reason and supernatural faith in one complex act; and it comes home to all men, educated and ignorant, young and old. And it is the point to which, after all {620} and in fact, all religious minds tend, and in which they ultimately rest, even if they do not start from it. Without an intimate apprehension of the personal character of our Saviour, what professes to be faith is little more than an act of ratiocination. If faith is to live, it must love; it must lovingly live in the author of faith as a true and living being, _in Deo vivo et vero_; according to the saying of the Samaritans to their towns-woman: "We now believe, not for thy saying, for we ourselves have heard him." Many doctrines may be held implicitly; but to see him as if intuitively is the very promise and gift of him who is the object of the intuition. We are constrained to believe when it is he that speaks to us about himself.

Such undeniably is the characteristic of divine faith viewed in itself; but here we are concerned, not simply with faith, but with its logical antecedents; and the question returns on which we have already touched, as a difficulty with Protestants--how can our Lord's life, as recorded in the Gospels, be a logical ground of faith, unless we set out with assuming the truth of those Gospels; that is, without assuming as proved the original matter of doubt? And Protestant apologists, it may be urged--Paley for instance--show their sense of this difficulty when they place the argument drawn from our Lord's character only among the auxiliary evidences of Christianity. Now the following answer may fairly be made to this objection; nor need we grudge Protestants the use of it, for, as will appear in the sequel, it proves too much for their purpose, as being an argument for the divinity not only of Christ's mission, but of that of his church also. However, we say this by the way.

It may be maintained then, that, making as large an allowance as the most sceptical mind, when pressed to state its demands in full, would desire, we are at least safe in asserting that the books of the New Testament, taken as a whole, existed about the middle of the second century, and were then received by Christians, or were in the way of being received, and nothing else but them was received, as the authoritative record of the origin and rise of their religion. In that first age they were the only account of the mode in which Christianity was introduced to the world. Internal as well as external evidence sanctions us in so speaking. Four Gospels, the book of the acts of the Apostles, various Apostolic writings, made up then, as now, our sacred books. Whether there was a book more or less, say even an important book, does not affect the general character of the religion as those books set it forth. Omit one or other of the Gospels, and three or four Epistles, and the outline and nature of its objects and its teaching remain what they were before the omission. The moral peculiarities, if particular, of its Founder are, on the whole, identical, whether we learn them from St. Matthew, St. John, St. Peter, or St. Paul. He is not in one book a Socrates, in another a Zeno, and in a third an Epicurus. Much less is the religion changed or obscured by the loss of particular chapters or verses, or even by inaccuracy in fact, or by error in opinion, (supposing _per impossible_ such a charge could be made good,) in particular portions of a book. For argument's sake, suppose that the three first Gospels are an accidental collection of traditions or legends, for which no one is responsible, and in which Christians put faith because there was nothing else to put faith in. This is the limit to which extreme scepticism can proceed, and we are willing to commence our argument by granting it. Still, starting at this disadvantage, we should be prepared to argue, that if, in spite of this, and after all, there be shadowed out in these anonymous and fortuitous documents a teacher _sui generis_, distinct, consistent, and original, then does that picture, thus accidentally resulting, for the very reason {621} of its accidental composition, only become more marvellous; then he is an historical fact and again a supernatural or divine fact--historical from the consistency of the representation, and because the time cannot be assigned when it was not received as a reality; and supernatural, in proportion as the qualities, with which he is invested in those writings, are incompatible with what it is reasonable or possible to ascribe to human nature viewed simply in itself. Let these writings be as open to criticism, whether as to their origin or their text, as sceptics can maintain; nevertheless the representation in question is there, and forces upon the mind a conviction that it records a fact, and a superhuman fact, just as the reflection of an object in a stream remains in its definite form, however rapid the current, and however many the ripples, and is a sure warrant to us of the presence of the object on the bank, though that object be out of sight.

Such, we conceive, though stated in our own words, is the argument drawn out in the pages before us, or rather such is the ground on which the argument is raised; and the interest which it has excited lies, not in its novelty, but in the particular mode in which it is brought before the reader, in the originality and preciseness of certain strokes by which is traced out for us the outline of the divine teacher. These strokes are not always correct; they are sometimes gratuitous, sometimes derogatory to their object; but they are always determinate; and, being such, they present an old argument before us with a certain freshness, which, because it is old, is necessary for its being effective.

We do not wonder at all, then, at the sensation which the volume is said to have caused at Oxford, and among the Anglicans of the Oxford school, after the wearisome doubt and disquiet of the last ten years; for it has opened the prospect of a successful issue of inquiries in an all-important province of thought, where there seemed to be no thoroughfare. Distinct as are the liberal and catholicising parties in the Anglican Church, both in their principles and their policy, it must not be supposed that they are as distinct in the members that compose them. No line of demarcation can be drawn between the one collection of men and the other, in fact; for no two minds are altogether alike, and, individually, Anglicans have each his own shade of opinion, and belong partly to this school, partly to that. Or, rather, there is a large body of men who are neither the one nor the other; they cannot be called an intermediate party, for they have no discriminating watch-words; they range from those who are almost Catholic to those who are almost liberals. They are not liberals, because they do not glory in a state of doubt; they cannot profess to be "Anglo-Catholics," because they are not prepared to give an eternal assent to all that is put forth by the church as truth of revelation. These are the men who, if they could, would unite old ideas with new; who cannot give up tradition, yet are loth to shut the door to progress; who look for a more exact adjustment of faith with reason than has hitherto been attained; who love the conclusions of Catholic theology better than the proofs, and the methods of modern thought better than its results; and who, in the present wide unsettlement of religious opinion, believe indeed, or wish to believe, scripture and orthodox doctrine, taken as a whole, and cannot get themselves to avow any deliberate dissent from any part of either, but still, not knowing how to defend their belief with logical exactness, or at least feeling that there are large unsatisfied objections lying against parts of it, or having misgivings lest there should be such, acquiesce in what is called a practical belief, that is, believe in revealed truths, only because belief in them is the safest course, because they are probable, and because belief in {622} consequence is a duty, not as if they felt absolutely certain, though they will not allow themselves to be actually in doubt. Such is about the description to be given of them as a class, though, as we have said, they so materially differ from each other, that no general account of them can be applied strictly to any individual in their body.

Now, it is to this large class which we have been describing that such a work as that before us, in spite of the serious errors which they will not be slow to recognize in it, comes as a friend in need. They do not stumble at the author's inconsistencies or shortcomings; they are arrested by his professed purpose, and are profoundly moved by his successful hits (as they may be called) toward fulfilling it. Remarks on the gospel history, such as Paley's they feel to be casual and superficial; such as Rousseau's, to be vague and declamatory: they wish to justify with their intellect all that they believe with their heart; they cannot separate their ideas of religion from its revealed object; but they have an aching dissatisfaction within them, that they apprehend him so dimly, when they would fain (as it were) see and touch him as well as hear. When, then, they have logical grounds presented to them for holding that the recorded picture of our Lord is its own evidence, that it carries with it its own reality and authority, that his "revelatio" is "revelata" in the very act of being a "revelatio," it is as if he himself said to them, as he once said to his disciples, "It is I, be not afraid;" and the clouds at once clear off, and the waters subside, and the land is gained for which they are looking out.

The author before us, then, has the merit of promising what, if he could fulfil it, would entitle him to the gratitude of thousands. We do not say, we are very far from thinking, that he has actually accomplished so high an enterprise, though he seems to be ambitious enough to hope that he has not come far short of it. He somewhere calls his book a treatise; he would have done better to call it an essay; nor need he have been ashamed of a word which Locke has used in his work on the Human Understanding. Before concluding, we shall take occasion to express our serious sense, how very much his execution falls below his purpose; but certainly it is a great purpose which he sets before him, and for that he is to be praised. And there is at least this singular merit in his performance, as he has given it to the public, that he is clear-sighted and fair enough to view our Lord's work in its true light, as including in it the establishment of a visible kingdom or church. In proportion, then, as we shall presently find it our duty to pass some severe remarks upon his volume, as it comes before us, so do we feel bound, before doing so, to give some specimens of it in that point of view in which we consider it really to subserve the cause of revealed truth. And in the sketch which we are now about to give of the first steps of his investigation, we must not be understood to make him responsible for the language in which we shall exhibit them to our readers, and which will unavoidably involve our own corrections of his ailment, and our own coloring.

Among a people, then, accustomed by the most sacred traditions of their religion to a belief in the appearance, from time to time, of divine messengers for their instruction and reformation, and to the expectation of one such messenger to come, the last and greatest of all, who should also be their king and deliverer as well as their teacher, suddenly is found, after a long break in the succession and a period of national degradation, a prophet of the old stamp, in one of the deserts of the country---John, the son of Zachary. He announces the promised kingdom as close at hand, calls his countrymen to repentance, and institutes a rite symbolical of it. The people seem disposed to take him for the destined Saviour; but he points out to them a {623} private person in the crowd which is flocking about him; and henceforth the interest which his own preaching has excited centres in that other. Thus our Lord is introduced to the notice of his countrymen.

Thus brought before the world, he opens his mission. What is the first impression it makes upon us? Admiration of its singular simplicity both as to object and work. Such of course ought to be its character, if it was to be the fulfilment of the ancient, long-expected promise; and such it was, as our Lord proclaimed it. Other men, who do a work, do not set about it as their object; they make several failures; they are led on to it by circumstances; they miscalculate their powers; or they are drifted from the first in a direction different from that which they had chosen; they do most where they are expected to do least. But our Lord said and did. "He formed one plan and executed it," (p. 18). Next, what was that plan? Let us consider the force of the words in which, as the Baptist before him, he introduced his ministry; "The kingdom of God is at hand." What was meant by the kingdom of God? "The conception was no new one, but familiar to every Jew," (p. 19.) At the first formation of the nation and state of the Israelites the Almighty had been their king; when a line of earthly kings was introduced, then God spoke by the prophets. The existence of the theocracy was the very constitution and boast of Israel, as limited monarchy, liberty, and equality are the boast respectively of certain modern nations. Moreover, the gospel proclamation ran, "Poenitentiam agite; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand;" here again was another and recognized token of a theophany; for the mission of a prophet, as we have said above, was commonly a call to reformation and expiation of sin. A divine mission, then, such as our Lord's, was a falling back upon the original covenant between God and his people; but next, while it was an event of old and familiar occurrence, it ever had carried with it in its past instances something new, in connection with the circumstances under which it took place. The prophets were accustomed to give interpretations, or to introduce modifications of the letter of the law, to add to its conditions and to enlarge its application. It was to be expected, then, that now, when the new prophet, to whom the Baptist pointed, opened his commission, he too, in like manner, would be found to be engaged in a restoration, but in a restoration which should also be a religious advance; and that the more if he really was the special, final prophet of the theocracy, to whom all former prophets had looked forward, and in whom their long and august line was to be summed up and perfected. In proportion as his work was to be more signal, so would his new revelations be wider and more wonderful.

Did our Lord fulfil these expectations? Yes, there was this peculiarity in his mission, that he came not only as one of the prophets in the kingdom of God, but as the king himself of that kingdom. Thus his mission involves the most exact return to the original polity of Israel, which the appointment of Saul had disarranged, while it recognizes also the line of prophets, and infuses a new spirit into the law. Throughout his ministry our Lord claimed and received the title of king, which no prophet ever had done before. On his birth, the wise men came to worship "the king of the Jews;" "thou art the Son of God, thou art the king of Israel," cried Nathanael after his baptism; and on his cross the charge recorded against him was that he professed to be "king of the Jews." "During his whole public life," says the author, "he is distinguished from the other prominent characters of Jewish history by his unbounded personal pretensions. He calls himself habitually king and master. He claims expressly the character of that divine Messiah for which the ancient prophets had directed the nation to look," (page 25.)

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He is, then, a King, as well as a Prophet; but is he as one of the old heroic kings, David or Solomon? Had such been his pretension, he had not, in his own words, "discerned the signs of the times." It would have been a false step in him, into which other would-be champions of Israel, before and after him, actually fell, and in consequence failed. But here this young Prophet is from the first distinct, decided, and original. His contemporaries, indeed, the wisest, the most experienced, were wedded to the notion of a revival of the barbaric kingdom. "Their heads were full of the languid dreams of commentators, the impracticable pedantries of men who live in the past," (p. 27.) But he gave to the old prophetic promises an interpretation which they could undeniably bear, but which they did not immediately suggest; which we can maintain to be true, while we can deny them to be imperative. He had his own prompt, definite conception of the restored theocracy; it was his own, and not another's; it was suited to the new age; it was triumphantly carried out in the event.