Dr. Cumming

Review of:
The End; or, Proximate Signs of the Close of this Dispensation (by John Cumming, 1855).

Part 1: June 14, 1856.

One of the articles in the last number of the Quarterly Review concludes with the expression of the writer's satisfaction at the popularity of what, in a singularly narrow and arbitrary sense of the word, is called religious literature. "It shows," says the Reviewer, “that faith is still alive, and that the heart of the nation is still sound." To our apprehension, the fact in question shows no such thing. What is wanted is not that theology should be popular, but that good theology should be popular; for as nothing was intended for nobler uses, nothing can be degraded to viler uses. To us, no sign of the times is more portentous than the influence and the popularity of men like Dr. Cumming; for it shows, not that people care for theology, but that, now as ever, they love to pervert it into an instrument for the excitement and gratification of some of the meanest appetites of human nature—the grovelling superstition which finds its natural aliment in omens drawn from the howling of a dog or the spilling of a saltcellar, and the craving for excitement which leads many who consider theatres wicked, and novels "dangerous," to work up all history into a romance more false and more extravagant than any that issue from the pen of Mr. G. W. M. Reynolds.

Dr. Cumming preaches as weekly novelists write. He collects a set of piquant stories from the newspapers, or from histories of the French Revolution—strings them together with a few morsels of pseudo-history and crude speculation stolen from more learned, if not wiser, writers than himself—ornaments them with wretched scraps of what is meant for eloquence—and works up the whole into a sort of romance of prophecy , in which the holiest personages are the actors, the most awful facts the scenery, and the hour of death and the day of judgment the catastrophe. To those who from their souls reverence the awful truths which are thus coarsely brought forward to tickle the curiosity and to warm the imaginations of great crowds of people, there is something ominous in the ignorance, the dishonesty, and the flattery of a writer who has obtained such extraordinary popularity. We do not use these words at random—we will prove the perfect propriety of every one of them.

First, then, we charge Dr. Cumrning with gross ignorance. His object is to insinuate—for he does not go so far as explicitly to assert—that the end of the world is to take place in 1865, and this he does on the strength of certain passages in the Greek Testament, and their connexion with various historical events. We will show that he makes the grossest blunders, both in his Greek and in his history. At p. 130 of The End, we read—"Unpolite literally means living out of the city." Unpolite means unpolished; and in early English writers, as Mr. Trench tells us, "polite" is applied to looking-glasses and other polished bodies. At p. 184, we learn, in a commentary on the verse, "This generation (γενεα) shall not pass away till all these things be fulfilled," that "a generation, in the sense of an existing people of thirty years, was not known to the ancients." If Dr. Cumming will look at the 250th line of the 1st book of the Iliad, he will read —if he can—

τώ δ ήδη δύο μέν γενεαί μερόπων άνθρώπων έφθίαθ

And in the second book and 142nd chapter of Herodotus, γενεαί γάρ τρεΐς άνδρών έκατόν έτεα έστι—"Three generations of men are a hundred years." At page 127, we find an attempt to identify Sebastopol with Armageddon, in which we read the following:—"Sebastopol, the august city. If its ancient spelling was, as I believe, Sebasteapol, my derivation seems most probably the correct one." This is a happy combination of historical and classical absurdity. Dr. Cumming argues against the opinion that Sebastopol means the "City of Augustus," obviously in total ignorance of the fact that it was founded within the last century, and that its name was in express allusion to the Russian plan of establishing a new Greek empire; and he obviously supposes either that there is a Greek word σεβαστέος-εα-εον, or that the feminine of σεβαστέος is σεβαστεα. A blunder of a similar kind occurs at p. 145:—"The children of Sarah, I may observe, are properly called Saracens;" and shortly after occur some quotations from Gibbon. If Dr. Cumming had extended his researches in that author a little further, he would have found the following note:—"The name (Saracen) has been derived ridiculously from Sarah, obscurely from Saraka, more plausibly from Arabic words which signify a thievish character or oriental situation." On this, as Dean Milman informs us, Dr. Clarke remarks that the derivation is "Zara, Zaara, Sara, the desert, whence Saracenic—children of the desert, not of the wife of Abraham." Dr. Cumming is particularly unfortunate in all that he says about the Saracens. One of his great points is the drying-up of the Euphrates, which he interprets to mean the decline of the Turkish power. Upon this theory he observes, "nothing is more usual than to call a people by the name of the river on whose banks their chief capital is built. The Saracens, after their first irruption ceased, settled finally in Bagdad on the Euphrates." And in order to leave no doubt on his reader's mind, he goes on:—"These Saracens settled in Bagdad, on the banks of the Euphrates; and from that very spot—Bagdad on the Euphrates—the Turks," &c. It is a little unfortunate that Bagdad is not on the Euphrates, but on the eastern bank of the Tigris, some thirty miles off. Suppose, however, that Bagdad had been on the Euphrates, that fact would not have helped Dr. Cumming's theory, unless he could have shown that the people who were settled on the Euphrates were the same people who afterwards took Constantinople—that is, unless he could identify the Saracens with the Turks. In order to do this, he quotes Gibbon to show that Alp Arslan crossed the Euphrates at the head of "immense squadrons of Turkish horse," and "that myriads of Turkish horsemen overspead the Greek empire, and at last took Constantinople." That Alp Arslan crossed the Euphrates is very true; though, as he crossed many other rivers, and as his tribe came from the shores of the Caspian Sea, we do not think the fact is very material. But Dr. Cumming, with all his misrepresentations, is too ignorant to misrepresent enough for his purpose. He is obviously not aware that the Turks who followed Alp Arslan were quite different people from the Turks who took Constantinople. The first were Seljukians, and the second Ottomans, who, says Gibbon,  “had formerly pitched their tents on the banks of the Oxus." Dr. Cumming's identification of the Turks with the Euphrates is as much as if a man should attempt to identify Normandy with the river Trent and the Romans by the following sort of argument:—York on the Trent was the capital of one of the Roman provinces in Britain; the Danes crossed the Trent in the time of Alfred, and as they also conquered Normandy, a prophecy which applies to the Trent may be taken to refer to Normandy.

Another wonderful specimen of ignorance is Dr. Cumming's interpretation of the thirty-eighth chapter of Ezekiel. Amongst Various tribes mentioned in that chapter, we read of "Gomer and his bands;" and Dr. Cumming interprets the prophecy to mean that Russia, allied to Germany, shall make war upon "Tarshish and his young lions"—that is, England—shall overthrew the liberties of Continental Europe, and shall be finally destroyed by miracle in Palestine. It strikes one as odd that a prophecy so minute as to foretel that England would make use of three lions as an armorial bearing, should omit all mention of France in an account of the late war; but we are not at present upon the subject of Dr. Cumming's honesty—we have only to speak of his ignorance. He has the extraordinary audacity to say that Crimea (Cimmeria) is derived from Gomer—that Germany is derived from Gomer—that the ancient name of the Welsh (Cymry) is derived from Gomer—and that "Cumberland, into which many of the Gomerian inhabitants of Wales spread (of course Dr. Cumming never heard of the kingdom of Strathcluyd) literally means Gomerland." It is wonderful enough that any human being should ground the most insignificant conclusion upon such miserable random guessing as this; but Dr. Cumming not only uses this wretched nonsense as one of the premises of an argument of which the end of the world is the conclusion, but he also overlooks the fact, that if his supposition is correct, it overthrows his conclusion. If Gomer and his bands represent all people of German or Celtic descent, they clearly include England; so that, when Dr. Cumming patriotically says, "Throughout the whole, it is to me so delightful that Tarshish stands aloof from the confederacy," he forgets that if we have to enter it as Gomerians, it will do us very little good to be out of it as British lions. It is an amusing illustration of the elastic character of this theory, that whilst neither Dr. Cumming nor Mr. Chamberlain—from whom, as he says, he has appropriated it—has observed this obvious consequence, Mr. Chamberlain thinks that France must be included in the bands of Gomer, apparently because, but for that expedient, it would be left out of the prophecy altogether; whilst Dr. Cumming hesitates, because France has not taken the Emperor of Russia's side. It does not occur to either of the prophets that, if France can neither be left out nor brought in without destroying the application of the prediction to the facts, there must be a hitch somewhere. They obviously think it quite the fault of the events that their interpretation has come wrong.

These are fair specimens of Dr. Cumming's learning. We proceed to justify our charge of dishonesty. Dr. Cumming is dishonest in argument—he is dishonest in contradicting himself to serve his temporary purposes—and lastly, he is guilty of dishonesty, simpler munditis—that species of dishonesty which consists in publishing as its own what is written by other people. His dishonesty in argument takes all forms, from careless haste up to positive mis-statement and self-contradiction. The signs of the end of the world are, he says, to be partly earthquakes, partly the pouring out of the seventh vial in the air, and partly the fact that the seventh thousand years since the creation is soon to commence. It is impossible to believe that he uses any one of these arguments in good faith. At least, if he does, his understanding must really be more contemptible than that of an old woman who is frightened at a death-watch. First, as to the earthquakes. It appears that in December, 1854, there were two shocks felt at Nice, which threw down some chimneys; and there were also two at Turin, which made the inhabitants fun out of their houses. Can we believe in the honesty of a man who grounds upon such trifles as these—which are of almost daily occurrence in many parts of Southern Europe—the assertion that "Italy begins to heave with subterranean forces— Rome is doomed to disappear in a terrible convulsion?" Next follows a long extract from "Our own Correspondent"—for whose style and truthfulness Dr. Cumming has a characteristic admiration—describing an earthquake at Broussa which destroyed the town and three hundred people; and this is eked out with a reference to two slight shocks—one at Perth, which did nothing at all, and one in New Zealand, which threw down a chimney and made the dogs bark. Some persons, says our seer, have remarked that earthquakes are common; but these were in divers places, and moreover, common or not, they were to be signs of the end.

From the dishonesty of folly we pass to the dishonesty of reckless mis-statement. The seventh vial was to be poured out on the air, and accordingly, says Dr. Cumming, the air is infected by a mysterious taint, whence come cholera, potato disease, &c. &c. Now, on other grounds. Dr. Cumming puts the pouring out of the seventh vial in 1848, and he points to the cholera of 1849 as a proof that the air was then tainted. He suppresses the fact that the cholera first appeared in 1832, and that it was then far more violent and destructive than in 1849. More mischievous pages than those which Dr. Cumming has written on this subject we have never read. He says that the cholera is a mysterious taint which falls upon all alike, that sanitary measures cannot altogether arrest it, that ordinary disease has become intractable, and that there is reason to think that the atmosphere has become corrupt, and that the constitution of man is radically weakened. Those who know the extreme proneness of the poor to all sorts of superstitions upon these subjects, the difficulty with which they are roused to take precautions against epidemics, and their tendency to a helpless fatalism, cloaking itself under so-called religious phrases, will appreciate the injury likely to be done by filling their minds with such nonsense as this. God's great judgment of pestilence is trying enough to flesh and blood of itself; and we have no words to express our indignation against the man who makes, not the Bible, but his own crude, flimsy, and distorted perversions of it, the instrument of panics which but too often justify themselves.

Another instance of the same kind of trilling with truth for the purposes of argument, is to be found in Dr. Cumming's theories about the conversion of the Jews. His assertions upon this subject are perfectly bewildering in their absurdity and recklessness. The property of the Jew, says Dr. Cumming, is everywhere portable—"He is ready to move at a day's notice; his money is all in the shape of gold, silver, or property at least easy convertible." That Jews have, by persecution of various kinds, been for the most part driven into commercial pursuits, may be very true; but we imagine that Baron Rothschild would be very sorry to "move at a moment's notice," and would not find it very easy to do so if he wished it. "In the next place," we hear, "the Jews have begun at this moment to have a literature." We rather supposed that an eminent legislator called Moses, an eminent poet named David, and some prophets, perhaps not inferior to Dr. Cumming, had been Jews. We have certainly seen an excellent and cheap translation of their works extensively circulated, and we have also heard of such names as Spinoza, Mendelssohn, and others, who made some figure in the world; but we had certainly not heard of the remarkable fact to which Dr. Cumming alludes—"There is a newspaper called the Hebrew Observer, which I read." Certainly, after that, the world must be near its end. Another cheering fact is, that" there is a very able man, an American, a Mr. Noah—the name seems singular to us— who has collected a million of dollars for the purpose of rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem." The name is not so singular to us as to Dr. Cumming. A gentleman rejoicing in the name of M. M. Noah is commemorated, in a manner less creditable than remarkable, in the Memoirs of the estimable James Gordon Bennett, the editor of the New York Herald. After a long career of extortion by means of the publication of secrets which came to his knowledge, this "able man" "assumed the insignia of one of the Hebrew monarchs," and ruined his paper by "proclaiming a rendezvous of the Israelitish race at Grand Island, near Buffalo." Whether there is any connexion between the two patriarchs, we cannot say; but we should feel a considerable disinclination, upon general principles, to trust any funds of ours to a speculative Yankee with a tendency to accumulate dollars for the purpose of instituting a Temple of Jerusalem Company. There is something exquisitely ludicrous in the notion of such stock-jobbing being made the subject of a prophecy.

The third reason alleged by Dr. Cumming for believing in the approaching end of the world is that the seventh thousand years since the creation may be expected to begin before long, which period was supposed by three Jewish rabbis to be set apart as a sabbath. How can we adequately describe the impudence of a man who passes his whole life in denouncing such of his fellow-Christians as attach any weight to tradition, and then calls upon them to believe a trumpery legend like this? We must not, however, suppose that Dr. Cumming confines himself to material signs of the approach of "the End." It is one of his principles that every prophecy is fulfilled both literally and metaphysically. His discretion upon this subject may be judged of by a single example:—" Under the seventh seal there were to be 'voices, and thunders, and lightnings.' . . . I read a single sentence from the Times newspaper not long ago: 'The electric condition of the political atmosphere in Europe at this moment.' How singular that what the Apocalyptic seer calls thunder and lightnings in the air, the recorder or history should translate into 'the electric condition of the population of Europe.'"

The dishonesty of arguments like these consists rather in the careless haste, in most important matters, of which they convict their author, than in distinct, definite untruth; but in one instance, at least, in The End, Dr. Cumming argues so disingenuously, and contradicts his former assertions so flatly, that we do not know how to give his conduct any milder name. About thirty pages of The End are devoted to proving that the power of the Roman Catholic Church has, since the year 1790, been declining throughout the world. This is made out by a great variety of very questionable facts indeed, taken, as usual, at second hand from Mr. Hobart Seymour—to whom, says Dr. Camming, "I am very deeply indebted," which is his way of describing plagiarism. The nature of the argument is equally disingenuous and characteristic. The Roman Catholic countries, it is stated, have increased in population more slowly than the Protestant countries during the time in question—therefore the Roman Catholic religion is tending towards extinction. There were 5000 priests in Paris before the Revolution—there are now only 800—therefore the Roman Catholic religion is declining in Paris. My neighbour has made only £20,000, whilst I have, during the same time, made £50,000—therefore he is poorer than he was at first. His father had three footmen, and he has only one—therefore he is poorer than his father. Nor is Dr. Cumming's ignorance less striking than his impudence; for he actually asserted, on the eve of the Concordat, that in Austria the Church was a mere creature of the State, existing by its permission. Nothing can be more characteristic than the notion that one creed loses because another gains, or that the strength of a creed is to be measured by the number of its priests. But, disingenuous and discreditable as such an argument may be, it is doubly discreditable in Dr. Cumming, for in another of his books he has maintained exactly the reverse. In a remarkable chapter in the Apocalyptic Sketches—which informs us, amongst other things, that "Napoleon's celebrated codes" were promulgated from 1789 to 1793, i.e., whilst Louis XVI. was king of France, and Napoleon a lieutenant, aged 22 or 23—Dr. Cumming maintains, that since 1790 the Roman Catholic power has been advancing. He says, "I believe the Roman Catholic Church is doomed to reach a prodigious but a very short ascendency. I believe she will set her throne among the stars, that the stroke which precipitates her to hell may be only the more terrific and destructive." In The End, he argues, as we have seen, that Popery is declining in Prance—in the Apocalyptic Sketches, he quotes the Times to prove that "France is resuming its old position as the defender and patron of Romanism;" and he goes on to talk the most extraordinary nonsense about the three frogs. In The End, he argues that Popery is failing in America —in the Apocalyptic Sketches, he says "America is overrun with Popish priests. In that country, Puseyism and Popery are rampant—so much so, that I see in it the working of a spirit that is supernatural." In The End, he asserts that the conversions to Popery in England are of slight importance, and that Protestantism is in fact increasing—in the Apocalyptic Sketches, he enumerates at length the encroachments of Popery upon Protestantism in England, and quotes without contradiction the anticipations of the Tablet, that in 1888 two-fifths of the population of this country will be Roman Catholic. What dependence can be placed upon the honesty of a man who contradicts himself thus; Why should it be counted less dishonest to obtain credit and to extend the circulation of a book by such statements as this, than to go into a shop and obtain goods on false pretences? We have, however, more to say upon Dr. Cumming; and we shall take an early opportunity of returning to him, and of justifying the appropriation of so much space to a subject which at first sight appears so insignificant.

Part 2: June 21, 1856.

We attempted last week to give our readers some specimens of Dr. Cumming's learning and of his intellectual honesty. Honesty of argument is more closely connected than many persons are willing to acknowledge with honesty of a more ordinary description; and it is not a little remarkable that a man who can bear to deduce such awful conclusions as Dr. Cumming attempts to draw from such frivolous arguments as we specified last week, should owe his popularity almost entirely to the use which he makes of the labours of others, and that he should not see that there is any kind of moral objection to such a course of conduct. Dr. Cumming's most popular book bears the title of Apocalyptic Sketches. It is a small, thick volume, gaudily bound in blue and gold, and is now, as we learn from the publisher's advertisement, in its "sixteenth thousand." The whole book is taken from Mr. E. B. Elliott's Horae Apocalypticae. It must not, however, be supposed that the appropriation is either concealed or denied. In the very first page of his Sketches, the author warns his readers of his intentions. He says,  I shall produce little that is original, less that is brilliant. I tell you candidly that I shall beg and borrow from the book of Mr. Elliott all that I can." He might have added another word, not unusually associated with the two which he has actually used, and much more appropriate than the word "beg," for Dr. Cumming does not say that he ever asked Mr. Elliott's leave before he "borrowed" his book. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that the Apocalyptic Sketches stand to the Horae Apocalypticae in the relation in which a certain kind of review stands to the book reviewed. It is, in fact, neither more nor less than an unauthorized abridgement of Mr. Elliott's book, published for Dr. Cumming's profit and reputation.

The minuteness and system of Dr. Cumming's appropriations is perfectly astonishing. He steals arrangement, interpretation, language, quotations—even quotations from the Bible. Thus the chapter about the opening of the Seven Seals is simply an abridgement of Mr. Elliott's; and it has this peculiar dishonesty, that whereas everything, down to the quotations, is taken from that author, he is occasionally referred to as one of several authorities. Thus—"various theories have been given by way of explanation— the most celebrated are those of Cunninghame and Elliott."—"A symbol which long perplexed apocalyptic commentators."—"Mr. Elliott alone seems to have reached the true solution." The obvious suggestion is, that though Dr. Cumming generally follows Mr. Elliott and consults his book, he looks upon him only as one amongst several commentators. In fact, Dr. Cumming has taken everything from Mr. Elliott. Thus Mr. Elliott says (i. 122), that the horse was a type of the Romans, that it was sacred to Mars, and that the Romans claimed to be the Mavortia-proles. Dr. Cumming says, "The Romans also called themselves Gens Mavortia, that is, the people of Mars, and the horse in their mythology was sacred to Mars." Dr. Cumming, in this lecture (Apoc. Sk. Lect. iii.), quotes Gibbon three times, Dion Cassius once, and Aurelius Victor once—every one of which quotations he makes on his own authority, and every one of which is stolen from Mr. Elliott. Indeed, the audacity of his conduct in this respect is perfectly monstrous. We open his pages quite at random, and we are always sure to find stolen goods. Thus (Apoc. Sk., p. 177), "Gibbon, to whom I have so frequently referred, describes the state of that century in which we believe the witnesses gave their testimony, in the following words;" and then follow two quotations from Gibbon. We turn to that part of Mr. Elliott's book which refers to the prophecy on which Dr. Cumming is lecturing, and find (ii. 207) the same passages of Gibbon quoted in the very same words upon the very same subject. The next sentence in Mr. Elliott's book contains a quotation from Mosheim of five lines. The same quotation, with the exception of four immaterial words at the end, occurs in the same place in Dr. Cumming. It is disgraceful enough to steal at all; but to steal what it is disgraceful not to possess is doubly disgraceful. A clergyman ought to know his Bible; but Dr. Cumming gets even his Biblical quotations from Mr. Elliott. In his third lecture, to which we have already referred, he illustrates Rev. iv. 12—17 by a reference to Jer. iv. 23, 24, 28, 29, and to Hos. x.; and at p. 194, he illustrates Rev. xi. 12 by a reference to Is. xiv. 13. All of these are taken from Mr. Elliott, together with the substance of the context in which they occur. In another place (Apocalyptic Sketches, p. 184), Dr. Cumming says:—" One or two passages of this [the Noble Lesson of Peter Waldo] I copy from Mr. Faber's translation." In fact, it is copied from a quotation from Mr. Faber's translation, made by Mr. Elliott, vol. ii.350. We should only tire our readers by multiplying examples. Dr. Cumming lives upon other men's learning as distinctly as upon his own ignorance and audacity; and yet, ignorant and dishonest as he is, he has published between thirty and forty works of different kinds, and has obtained an amount of popularity and influence amongst a large class of disciples, which deserves to be remembered as one of the most curious of all modern commentaries upon the old text, Populus vult decipi et decipiatur.

It may be asked, what end is to be answered by attacking Dr. Cumming? If he and his congregation are mutually satisfied, why should any one else interfere? We have no personal knowledge whatever of him or of his affairs. We look only at the influence which he exercises, and at the doctrine which he preaches; and we feel very strongly that such influence ought not to be exercised, nor such doctrine to be preached, by incompetent persons, without some kind of protest. Consider what is the doctrine preached by Dr. Cumming, and what are its obvious consequences. An enormous proportion of it consists of denunciations of the Papists, and announcements of the approach of the end of the world. It is not too much to say, that he is principally occupied in disseminating, as widely as possible, mutual distrust and indignation between two great religious communities, and in unsettling the minds of his own immediate flock in the pursuit of all their ordinary duties. We are far from saying that controversies between various Christian bodies can always be avoided, and we are far from wishing to express any opinion against the study of unfulfilled prophecy; but we do say that these are not themes to be handled lightly. They are not proper subjects for popular lectures, more especially when the lecturer is not only densely ignorant of what he professes to know, but knows nothing at all except at second-hand. Look at the moral aspect of such conduct as Dr. Cumming's. If the end of the world is not at hand, can anything be more dangerous and more mischievous than to flatter the natural tendency of mankind to superstition, by saying that it is, and to tickle their imaginations by elevating the most commonplace occurrences to the dignity of portents? Dr. Cumming himself thinks it necessary constantly to warn his hearers that, even if the end of the world should be approaching, that circumstance ought to make no change in their conduct. He obviously, therefore, is of opinion that there is such a risk; and yet it is perfectly clear that he incurs the risk without any of the qualifications which could authorize him to do so. When a man of great learning, like Mr. Elliott, gives himself up to the study of the Apocalypse for many years, he has a right to his own opinion; and if he chooses to announce the approaching destruction of the world, he deserves, at least, respectful attention and a serious answer. But when a man claims to make such assertions on the strength of certain interpretations of the Greek Testament, in hopeless ignorance of Greek—and on the strength of the coincidence of history with prophecy, in equally hopeless ignorance both of history and of geography—it is impossible not to feel that he is guilty of a very grave offence against the most elementary principles of modesty and morality. It is no disgrace to a man to have no opinion about the meaning of the book of the Revelation, but it is a very great disgrace to him to be willing to take the risk of doing very serious harm, and propagating most dangerous errors on the strength of second-hand information. It is a precisely parallel case to medical quackery. A man devotes himself for many years to the study of some new medical discovery—let us say to hydropathy. He publishes the result of his experience in a book of great science and research, containing, as such a book naturally would, some things calculated to amuse or excite ordinary unscientific readers; and thereupon another man, totally ignorant of the whole subject, picks out all the amusing parts of the book, connects them together with a quantity of flimsy rhetorical nonsense of his own, and obtains, with a considerable portion of mankind, the credit of being a great physician on the strength of his performance. There are numbers of people who care little enough about theology, but who are quite able to enjoy long stories dramatically got up about earthquakes and revolutions— just as there are not a few persons who, without any real knowledge of medicine, derive an unwholesome satisfaction from reading accounts of curious diseases and surgical operations. It is impossible to read Dr. Cumming's books without feeling that the writer knows that he is a quack. He compliments and flatters everybody, right and left—with the exception of the unfortunate Roman Catholics—by way of proving himself to be a man of general information. We subjoin a few specimens:—"I have no sympathy with the romance, I have as little with the novel [perhaps from the jealousy between two of a trade], but I think the newspaper of the nineteenth century is man unconsciously exclaiming—It is done;" and, accordingly, Dr. Cumming's notion of criticism is to cut out every passage of the Times in which there is any such phrase as "this terrible convulsion," "this great crisis," "this moral earthquake," and to read it to his congregation as a fulfilment of the Apocalypse. Sir Archibald Alison's books are "intensely interesting," and abound in "philosophical and beautiful reflections." Louis Napoleon is the "sagacious and powerful ruler of France." Mr. Carlyle is an "acute observer and profound philosopher;" and the "perplexity of nations" is expounded to refer, amongst other things, to those "great systems of Administrative Reform" of which we have all heard rather more than enough. The most wonderful proofs of the emptiness and fundamental irreverence of his mind, are to be found in the ornaments of his style. We will conclude with a single specimen, merely remarking, that "no less than 16,000 copies" of the book in which it first occurs have been circulated, and that the author was so delighted with it that he repeated it almost verbatim in another publication, The End:— "It is not the nervous system, it is not galvanism, it is not electricity, that gives its pulses to your heart. It is God. Your heart first beats, then it halts; again it beats, and then it halts; then it beats again, and then another pause. It seems to me, that during each pause that intervenes between each beat, your heart lifts itself up to God, and says, 'may I beat again? and God says, 'another beat.' And it asks, 'may I beat again?' and God says, 'another beat still.'"

Surely a man who, claiming to address his fellow-creatures with authority upon the most awful topics, circulates enormous masses of original blunders and pilfered learning, connected and adorned with such tawdry nonsense as this, does as great an amount of injury to his neighbours as almost any single individual can do; for the direct tendency of his conduct is to bring contempt and discredit upon all that he professes to teach and to believe.

Saturday Review, June 14 and 21, 1856.