THE FOREIGN QUARTERLY REVIEW. No. XLII. FOR JULY, 1838. 1837. ART. I.-Johann Henry JUNG's, genannt | woe into every region where no other perSTILLING, Sämmtliche Shriften, in 13 son ever went before them. We know Bändern. Stuttgart. SCHEIBLE. 1835- now almost universally that Immanuel Kant is not a mystic, and that Göthe is not Vol. I. Stilling's Leben. (English, by a whimpering sentimentalist, as little as he Jackson.) is a god. But thore remains behind those II. Scenen aus dem Geister-Reiche. vulgar prolegomena a wide unbounded re. Chrysaon. gion of German thought, descending deep III. Die Liegesgeschichte der Christ- into the abyss of metaphysical questioning, lichen Religion in einer gem- and rising high into those loftiest regions meinnützigen Erklärung der of religion where we are invited to drink of Offenbarung Johannes. the waters of the river of life that flow IV. & V. Das Heimweh und der from beneath the throne of the Everlasting. Schlüssel zu demselben. This region is as yet untrodden by the most VI. Theobald der Schwärmer, und of us; and so far as we can judge from the Theorie der Geister Kunde. echoes of strange Babylonic voices, and the VII. & VIII. Der graue Mann. dark shadows of gigantic distortions that IX. Romane. have thence wandered over to our coasts, X. & XI. Des Christlichen Menschen- there seems to be no sufficient reason why Freunds Biblische Erzählun- we should disturb the peace of our souls by launching forth into this new voyage of perilous discovery. So far as we, from our point of view, can perceive, German theology, or German metaphysics, (for they are By the favor of more than twenty years' at bottom the same,) is a waste howling peace, and with the assistance of an under- wildernes of hopeless scepticism-an Baros standing which by its general soundness tonta more wild and wintry than that in and vigor more than compensates for which Prometheus was rock-bound by the what it may want in profoundity and com- anger of Jove-a province of Cimmerian prehensiveness, we English have now ar- darkness, where there is only light enough rived at a pretty satisfactory solution of the to see long dismal rows of cold intellectual common problems of German literature. faces prying curiously into the dissected Many things are known now-and form body of the dead Beautiful. Nor do we indeed part of the common atmosphere in allow ourselves to be deceived by the numwhich cultivated minds breathe-that twen- ber of wandering lights that ever and anon ty years ago were either altogether unknown, perform strange evolutions through that ator known only to those few "extravagant mosphere of darkness. We see that these and loving spirits" that will at all times luminaries have no healthy permanency like make a conscience of going for weal or the sun; and we know that the fields do gen. XII. Erzählungen. XIII. Schatzkästlein. Gedichte, &c. VOL. XXI. 18 the not grow green beneath them. And if at ologian there is no life of Christ at all; any time some calm dignified shape (a No. whole is mythus, allegory, epos; the miravalis perhaps), with the carriage of an cles, if they are not old wives' tales, are angel, sails solemnly through the inextri- mere magnified and glorified pictures of cable tumult of vain opinions, we are more nature's most common common-places; and confounded than consoled by such appar- to be a Christian is merely to live in the ition; we have not been accustomed to deal God-begotten idea of moral perfection.tion, with religious phantasmagoria; at all of which the name of the Messiah doubtless events a little floating poetry in the air will is the enduring type-but the name of Plato not compensate for the cold barren reality as much so. The Titanic architecture of of the earth; the Englishman as yet sees no- the Old Testament evaporates by a like thing that can invite him to the serious process into smoke. As Wolf taught a study of German theology. new catechism to the scholars of his coun- ous to read, a Hebrew parchment for the There can be no doubt that the Englishman in thus concluding, is acting in perfect conformity with that sound sense for which above all the races of men he is so remarkable. A genuine Englishman (we speak not of the few who delight in playing mountebank tricks) will not embark on a journey, merely for the pleasures of sailing in a balloon; he must know where he is going and he must also know that the ve hicle in which he travels will convey him thither in the most direct and expeditious manner. Now, what does German theolology offer to us by way of useful helps and aids in the perplexed journey that we all travel to the grave and to the undiscovered country beyond it? Has Immanuel Kant with his searching analysis and his com prehensive grasp has Herder with his restless spirit of investigation and his fiery heart that literally raged with humanity has Schleiermacher with all his pure Platonism of sentiment--has Gesenius with all his Hebrew-or Wegscheiden with all his reason-been able more clearly than we do tosee through that rent in the coffin of mortality beyond which the star of the Christian's hope shines benignly? Not they On the contrary, the tendency of all their doings seems to have been to undermine the foundations of Christianity and to leave us (with the exception of some smooth pious phraseology) exactly where we were when Tacitus denounced the "exitiabilis superstitio" and the "odium humani generis" that * In confirmation, or rather attestation, of distinguished the vulgar sect of the Naza- these general views, which we have ventured to express on the subject of the present state of renes. The fact is undeniable. The Ger- Christianity in Germany, we beg to submit two mans are not an irreligious nation-far from interesting and very characteristic specimens of it; but they certainly have succeeded most religious criticism from one of the first literary effectually, so far as their own national be- papers of the day-Mentzel's Literatur-Blatt. We make the extract purposely from a literary lief is concerned, in evaporating all that is paper, because the state of religion is always to solid and substantial in Christianity, in be sought for more among the laity than taking away from beneath our feet all that the clergy, who have an official character is real and historical in the faith of centu- a caste than the sentiments of a people. The to preserve, and represent more the opinions of ries. If to the English theologian the life first extract is in the shape of a criticism on Bohof Christ is sometimes little better than a len's exegetical work on Genesis, Königsberg, mechanical series of miracles, here at least 1835. The second expresses some general views we have a frame-work into which a soul fully justify any expressions, however strong, on the state of Protestantism in Germany, that may be breathed; but to the German the- that we have been led to use on the suject :— Why therefore, it will be asked, do we tempt God, by opening up this shoreless sea of doubt, and throwing the helmless barks of human souls abroad upon its waves? Are we envious of the fate of Pliny and desirous to throw away the precious gift of existence, for the idle curiosity of contempla ing with nearer gaze this smoke and fire of a burning mountain? If this analogy were perfectly appropriate in all points, the course of every wise man would be clear-to keep out of harm's way. But if God has thrown the dark valley of the shadow of death in the direct road between us and Heaven, it is not for us to turn aside from that perilous passage, because the light on the road which we have hitherto travelled has been uniformly pleasant and comfortable to the eye; and most certain is it that doubt and perplexity are the portals of Faith, as sorrow and anguish of soul and honest self-reproach are the beginnings of Sanctification. True it is that human nature in its present frail estate can scarcely afford to lose the glorious hope of immortality for any thing that Kant, or Hegel, or Göthe, have to offer in its stead; but still less can human nature afford to lose truth, and the love of truth, and the search of truth, and the constraining power of real. ity. What avails it to me that I hold the sceptre of the world in my hand, if all the "We think the author has treated the histori- world, and the immeasurable population of Rome cal contents of the book of Genesis somewhat ran in rivalry after the worship of Egyptian and too cavalierly. We are far, indeed, from wishing Syrian idols, more for curiosity's sake han from to conceal our ignorance behind what is called an real pious motive, amusing themselves also orthodox exegesis. We give up the whole form learnedly in the accommodation of these several of this book to the sharpest grammatical and systems to any philosophy that might happen to historical criticism. It is to us a matter of the be fashionable for the day-so the German Chrisutmcst indifference whether one author or two tians are now hovering in uncertainty between have composed it, or who that author was. But every different Confession of Religion, without the Mosaic legend of the creation has an internal seriously adhering to any The Catholics march significancy which raises it far above all other in the van of modern enlightenment, and become mythological representations of the ancient as sober as any Protestant; the Protestants begin world. It is at once more simple, and more pro-to think they have gone too far, and draw back found than all the rest. The manner in which the from their original stout reliance on private mysterious separation of the sexes, and the ori- judgment, and have commenced a public coquetgin of evil are explained, sufficiently attest this. ry with Catholic ideas, and Catholic forms. We ought accordingly to place the superior (The Oxford tracts among ourselves!) The excellence of the book of Genesis, not in difference between Lutheran and Reformed is no the merely external circumstances of its age, more heard of. A whole herd of North-German of Moses' authorship, but in the weight of its con- poets and philosophers, born Protestants, have tents, and the depth of its ideas. To estimate made a pilgrimage to the Catholic world, and this properly, to penetrate, so to speak, the mys- thence, metamorphosed into the most wild ultratic kernel of the narration, it is far more edifying montanes, they have sent forth a new crusade for the purposes of philosophy and religious con- against the ancient brethrer. Among the Cathosolation, than occupying ourselves with a mere !ics again, we have a whole party, the Anti-Ceshell. It is the thing, not the author that concerns libatists, between whom and the Protestants there The eternally true and beautiful requires exists really no essential difference. Then we no documents to prove it; as little can it be quib- have the fashionable philosophies succeeding bled away by sophisms and subtleties. It attests one another, or co-existing, and these philosoitself, and asks for no outward witness. A sub-phies possess a wonderful flexibility by which lime idea remains the same, from whatever brain, and in whatever region it had its birth."Literatur-Blatt, redigirt von Dr. Wolfgang Menzel, 28 Novbr. 1837. us. Christianity with us seems to stand pretty much in the same position that Heathenism did in the days of Hadrian. As in those days foreign gods were greedily adopted from all parts of the they can be adopted to any of the existing creeds, as easily as they can be made the instrument of creating a peculiar religion, each for itself. In the midst of all this confusion, the majority of the people find it most comfortable to remain in indifference, and where one thing seems as good as another, generally remain in the religion of their fathers."-Literatur-Blatt, 7 Novbr. 1836, |