Regina Baar3 May 07 – waits proofreading by Mandy Gagel
April 15, 2007
Page headings – Left and right: folio [105-106] or date [January 31, 1857] + Center: The
Saturday Review.
“Horne’s Introduction”, The Saturday Review, January 31, 1857: 105-106.
Horne’s Introduction1
The publication of a tenth edition of so large a work as Horne’s Introduction affords
striking evidence of the interest felt by the public in theology. There are, moreover,
special circumstances connected with the present edition, which increase the importance
which attaches to it. In order to adapt the book to the existing state of knowledge, two
gentlemen—Dr. Davidson and Dr. Tregelles—were associated with Mr. Horne in the task
of preparing this edition. Dr. Davidson wrote the whole of the second volume, which
consists of an introduction to the Old Testament; Dr. Tregelles wrote part of the fourth,
consisting principally of textual criticism on the New Testament, and edited the rest; and
Mr. Horne revised the first volume, which contains a summary of the evidences of the
authenticity and inspiration of the Bible, and the third, which is devoted to the subject of
biblical geography and antiquities. When the book was finally published in its present
form, so great a difference was apparent between Dr. Davidson’s volume and the others
that Mr. Horne and Dr. Tregelles took the very unusual step of disavowing all
responsibility for the views of their associate; and the publishers, we believe, divided the
work, so that the second volume now forms a distinct publication from the first, third, and
fourth. We do not wish to enter upon any of the personal questions to which these
proceedings have given birth, nor shall we discuss the theological correctness or
otherwise of the views respectively adopted by Mr. Horne and Dr. Davidson; but we
think it very important to call attention, not so much to the specific opinions of these
gentlemen upon the matters on which they differ, as to the different methods in which
they approach and handle them. We shall confine our remarks on the present occasion to
the first volume. We propose to take an early opportunity of referring to the second, by
Dr. Davidson; but as the third and fourth relate either to subjects of a special nature, or to
topics handled in a similar tone to that which prevails in the first volume, we do not
propose to refer to them further.
Thirty-eight years have passed since the first edition of the volume which we are
considering was published; and subsequent alterations and additions have not deprived it,
in any material degree, of the character which was almost sure to be impressed upon a
theological book written at that time. We wish to speak with all possible respect of a man
who has laboured so long and so usefully for his generation as Mr. Horne; but we do not
1
An Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures. By the
Rev. Hartwell Horne, B.D. Thenth Edition. Revised, corrected, and brought down to the
present time. Edited by the Rev. Thomas Hartwell Horne, B.D., the Rev. Samuel
Davidson, D.D., and Samuel Prideaux Tregelles, LL.D. 4 vols. London: Longmans. 1856
think that we are violating that rule in saying that, since his first appearance as an author,
the whole controversy to which he addressed himself has—in the minds at least of the
more thoughtful part of the community—shifted its ground to such an extent that both
parties are entitled to claim at each other’s hands a very different treatment from that
which they were accustomed to expect, and to afford, forty years ago. We will attempt to
describe the nature of this change.
A gentleman, who was some years since on a visit to a solicitor in a large country
town, found in his friend’s library a pamphlet, published in the early part of this century,
entitled, Trial of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, fishermen of Galilee, for Wilful and
Corrupt Perjury. There were of course a judge, a jury, and counsel for the Crown and for
the prisoners; and, as might have been expected, the proceedings terminated in a
triumphant acquittal. The pamphlet was a striking example of the whole tone of the
controversy upon the subject of the evidences of Christianity, which was carried on so
vehemently during the latter part of the last, and the early part of the present century.
Nothing can be more curious, in our day, than to remark the extreme narrowness of the
conception which all but the highest minds seem to have had of the points at issue.
Whatever they may have doubted, both parties appear to have agreed that there was a
certain set of opinions which, taken together, made up a definite system, called
Christianity, which was contained in the Bible; but the one party affirmed, and the other
denied, the possibility of answering certain à priori objections to its reception, and of
adducing sufficient positive evidence in its favour to induce a belief in it. It is curious to
see how instinctively the national mind looked upon the whole subject as a question for a
jury. Paley’s Evidences is nothing more than the speech of an advocate affecting the tone
of a judge, and the volume before us answers to the same description, except that it
neither is, nor affects to be, impartial. It would be unjust to call it bigoted or intolerant,
but it has some of the characteristics of intolerance. It is like the writing of a lawyer
determined to get all he possibly can for his client. In the time at which Mr. Horne wrote,
it was the Christian advocate’s duty to have an answer for any objection. There was the
Christian side, and the Infidel side, and it was no more the business of a Christian writer
to enter into, or to sympathize with the infidel’s difficulties, than it was the business of
the Duke of Wellington to suggest to Massena or Soult improvements in the plan of their
operations. The very first paragraph in Mr. Horne’s introduction says—“That there now
is, and that for more than eighteen centuries there has existed in the world, a religion
called the CHRISTIAN, and that its professors …. appeal to certain books by them
accounted sacred, as the basis on which their religion is founded, are facts which no one
can controvert;” and his conception of his duty seems to have been, that he had to act as
counsel for the Bible, not only answering all objections to its truth, but even when an
admission was made as to a general principle, objecting as much as possible to its
application to any particular fact.
A most remarkable illustration of this is to be found in the reasonings about the
Mosaic account of the creation and deluge. Pp. 582-6 are occupied by arguments to prove
that, consistently with the first chapter of Genesis, the earth may have existed for any
number of ages. At p. 586 there is a similar attempt to show that Genesis vii. 19 (“The
waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth, and all the high hills that were under the
whole heaven were covered”) is consistent with a partial deluge. But at p. 588 there is a
triumphant refutation of “Count Borch, who, towards the close of the eighteenth century,
attempted to prove Mount Etna to be 8000 years old by the different strata of lava
discovered therein,” and the process terminates in the following moral reflection:—“Faith
in a miracle rests upon testimony, but faith in their scheme must be founded on an
extreme desire to prove a falsehood.” Surely Mr. Horne can never have heard the old bar
joke. An action being brought for breaking the knees of a horse, lent by the plaintiff to
the defendant, the latter pleads first that the horse was never lent—secondly, that his
knees were never broken—thirdly, that they were broken when he was lent—and,
fourthly, that they were not broken when he was returned. Mr. Horne’s argument is, first,
that the Bible does not deny the antiquity of the earth, and, secondly, that Count Borch
failed to prove it. The whole tone in which various difficulties which have distressed the
most sincere Christians are dealt with, puts the same thing in a clearer light. For
example—the passages in which God is spoken of as putting “lying spirits” into the
mouths of prophets have not unnaturally caused much perplexity. “God,” says Mr. Horne,
“is charged by the opposers of divine revelation with being guilty of falsehood by
inspiring prophets with false messages and by violating his promises. The grossness of
such assertions is sufficiently disgusting, but it is the duty of a Christian advocate fully to
meet them and expose their falsehood.” In the same way, speaking of the tortures said to
have been inflicted by David on the Ammonites, Mr. Horne remarks:—“The cavils of the
objectors in this, as in every other instance, are utterly unfounded.” It is well worthy of
observation, that in this, as in some other instances, “the cavils of the objectors” are
refuted by an assertion that the passage upon which the objection is founded is a
mistranslation. No tenderness, however, is shown to the “objector” on this account. If he
had remained satisfied with statements which, as they stand, confessedly impugn the truth
and justice of God, the “Christian advocate” would have been perfectly satisfied for they
would have given him no trouble; but as soon as any one objects, not to the Bible, but to
a misrepresentation of its meaning, his objections are rebuked as “groundless,” “gross,”
and “disgusting.” Almost the whole volume might be quoted in proof of its entirely onesided character. At p. 442-6, we find an elaborate proof that unbelievers are “more
credulous” than Christians. At p. 31-32, we have an account of the opinions of various
Deists, from Lord Herbert of Cherbury to Voltaire, which ascribes to men most of whom
were possessed of considerable, some of pre-eminent, ability, opinions so widly absurd
and contradictory that no one out of Bedlam ever did or possibly could hold them. In fact,
it is hardly an exaggeration to say that any objection or demur to any doctrine which the
writer considers necessary to Christianity is either referred to the natural depravity of the
human heart or dismissed as a “groundless cavil.”
It is obvious that this kind of criticism was adapted entirely to an age in which the
energies of men were withdrawn from matters of speculation to the transaction of public
affairs, and in which what was called infidelity was considered—not entirely without
justice—as being only another name for political disaffection. Indeed, it must never be
forgotten that the shallowness and narrowness of the Christian advocacy of those days
was only equalled by the shallowness and narrowness of the counsel on the other side. In
the great ferment which followed the French Revolution, theological controversy was
constantly degraded into a kind of Old Bailey wrangle. The writers on the one side
inferred forgery and priestcraft from any text in the Bible which bore the slightest
appearance of inaccuracy, or which, by any possible mode of interpretation, seemed to be
opposed to morality. The writers on the other side treated every one who saw a difficulty
in the Bible as little better than a profligate blasphemer, and silenced every objection to
their own especial set of evidences of Christianity as a “groundless cavil” or an “infidel
suggestion.”
In some quarters, this bad fashion still survives; and we regret to say that, in many
instances, after a temporary lull, it is beginning to show symptoms of revival. Still it may
be affirmed, with some confidence, that the immense progress of knowledge of various
kinds which has taken place during the last forty years has produced a very different and
an improved state of opinion upon the subject. It has long since become obvious to minds
entitled to any kind of respect, that the proposition which seems to Mr. Horne the simple
statement of an incontrovertible fact is really an assertion of the most complicated kind.
To say “that there is a religion called the Christian” is something like saying that “there is
such a thing as humanity or philosophy;” and it is as impossible to establish, by a single
class of proofs, the truth that men ought to be Christians, as it would be to prove in a
similar manner that men ought to be humane. The meaning of the word “Christianity” is
so very indefinite that in all probability no two persons would define it in the same
manner; and indeed it is not easy to assign any very specific meaning to a term which is
intended to denote the aggregate opinions, feelings, and sentiments of vast numbers of
persons who have hardly a single opinion, feeling, or sentiment in common. Englishmen,
Frenchmen, Russians, Italians, and Abyssinians are all Christians. A member of the
Church of England, a Quaker, a Unitarian, the Chinese rebels—all claim the Christian
name; and it is therefore impossible to prove or to disprove the truth of Christianity, as
you would prove or disprove that a man stole a pocket-handkerchief at a given time and
place. One might as well attempt to prove, by judicial process, the proposition that A B is
a good man.
The recognition of this and similar truths has a most important bearing on the
whole method of biblical criticism. It shows that the principal question relating to the
Bible is not whether certain opinions about it are true or false, but what, in point of fact,
are its claims and its characteristics—questions which must be answered by a fair
application of the ordinary methods of criticism. No reasonable man in the present day
would think of maintaining that the Bible is a forgery. The strongest opponents of the
common opinions about it would admit that, as a matter of fact, it has exercised, and does
still exercise, the strongest possible influence over the human race—that at any rate a
great proportion of it was written by the authors usually supposed to have written it—and
that the parts of which the authenticity is disputed were written bonâ fide, and not forged
with sinister objects. On the other hand, those who hold in the strongest form the doctrine
of the inspiration of the Bible must feel that it cannot become them to shrink from the
conclusions to which a quiet examination of the volume may lead them—that the Bible
itself is the best evidence of its own nature and contents—and that the object which they
ought to keep in view is rather to ascertain how far their theories square with the fact,
than to stigmatize all who reject them as infidels and blasphemers. It is surely more
reverent to believe that the Bible stands upon a foundation quite independent of the
private opinions of a particular man or set of men, than to believe that its power would at
once be destroyed if certain opinions as to its nature and extent were to be shaken. It is
the Bible which sustains the opinions, and not the opinions which sustain the Bible; and
those who have the strongest sense of this truth will be the most candid, the most fearless,
and the most charitable inquirers into the greatest phenomenon that ever engaged the
attention of mankind. The Bible is a mine in which thousands of labourers may work, and
which will not be exhausted for generations to come. No doubt their exertions will show
that many—perhaps all—the opinions which have been framed upon the subject are more
or less false and incomplete; but it seems to us that nothing can be more grievously
injurious to the best interests of mankind than to declare that no one shall work in the
mine unless he is prepared, before he begins, to subscribe a declaration as to the thickness
of the vein and the purity of the ore. Surely the question as to what the Bible is, de facto,
takes precedence of the question as to what we may imagine and infer, on the strength of
à priori arguments, that it necessarily must be.