tions having certain date. Aside from these everything is confusion and obscurity." However strongly our feelings may be enlisted in favor of the young mathematician of Cambridge, and however much we may regret that he did not publish the results which he communicated to Mr. Airy in 1845, we are bound to respect the rule which common sense and the best interests of science have dictated, and which the British philosophers have been foremost in establishing, that questions of priority in discoveries shall be decided by the dates of their publication, either in a printed book, or among the papers of some learned society. Mr. Airy has obviously no intention of violating this rule; for in his letter to Le Verrier, of Oct. 14th, in which he announced that collateral researches had been made in England, and had led to results precisely similar to Le Verrier's, he says: "Probably I shall be called on to explain myself in regard to these researches. If in that case I give praise to others, I hope you will not consider it as weakening in any degree my opinion of your rights. You ought, without any doubt, to be regarded as the man who really predicted the place of the planet." Airy's paper in the Philosophical Magazine is written in strict accordance with this view. It does not contain a word which can detract from the credit, or compromise in any manner the rights, of the illustrious French astronomer. A letter written by Sir John Herschel on the 1st of Oct., and published in the Athenæum, contains a passage which M. Arago has animadverted upon with much severity. In this letter Herschel quotes a passage from his discourse pronounced before the British Association at Southampton, Sept. 10, 1846, as follows:-"We see it [the new planet] as Columbus saw America before leaving the coast of Spain. Its motions have been felt trembling along the far-reaching line of our analysis, with a certainty scarcely inferior to that of an ocular demonstration." Herschel remarks, that the calculations of Le Verrier would hardly have justified so positive an assurance as those words implied, had they not been corroborated by an independent investigation emanating from another source. M. Arago takes exception to this remark, and thinks it utterly at variance with Herschel's usual courtesy and reserve. For ourselves, we cannot discover in it a particle either of envy or malice;-feelings which we believe Sir John Herschel to be incapable of indulging. We understand him to mean that neither the calculations of Le Verrier nor those of Adams, taken separately, would have commanded the confidence which those mathematicians felt in their results, had they not both arrived, in dependently, at the same conclusion. This principle is universally recognized in courts of justice, in which the concurrent testimony of several persons to the same fact will be believed, without reference to the credibility of any one of the witnesses. This belief is founded on the improbability that several persons, who have had no opportunities of collusion with one another, should, agree in telling the same falsehood. That Sir John Herschel did not fully appreciate the force of Le Verrier's reasonings is sufficiently obvious; and that neither Herschel, Airy, nor Challis, placed much confidence in Mr. Adams' results is still more apparent, from the fact that they neither advised their publication, nor made any physical researches to verify them. But after the publication of Le Verrier's first approximation, nothing was more natural than to inquire how these two men, ignorant of each other's proceedings, and, perhaps, of each other's existence, could have arrived at the same conclusion, unless there was some truth in it. Then, and not till then, were the telescopes of England set at work. That the English philosophers have no disposition to pluck a single laurel from the brow of Le Verrier, is abundantly proved by the Copley medal having been awarded to him by the Royal Society of London. This magnanimous award was announced to the French Academy, at its session of Nov. 9, by a letter from Sir John Herschel. It settles the question of priority, and will quiet the apprehensions of Le Verrier's friends. The credit which will be awarded to Mr. Adams as a mathematician, will depend upon the knowledge of celestial mechanics and the skill in using it, which his calculations may prove him to possess; but his merit cannot be properly estimated till he submits his researches to the public eye. Mr. Adams has promised to publish his calculations at an early day; and, though it is now too late to place them in competition with those of Le Verrier, we may hope and predict that they will lay the foundation of an enviable reputation for himself. Whatever form the maturer labors of Mr. Adams may give to his calculations, the evidence is conclusive that, in 1845, they were less full and perfect than those since published by Le Verrier. On this point the testimony of Mr. Airy is unequivocal. In his letter to Le Verrier, mentioned above, he says:"I may add that the English investigations were not, I believe, altogether so extensive as those for which we are indebted to you.' Another proof of the imperfection of Mr. Adams' work is contained in the fact that he had omitted those preliminary corrections of the theory of Uranus, which Le Verrier made with great labor and remarkable exactness, and without which he perceived the impos sibility of arriving at results that could satisfy himself, or secure the confidence of others. Had Mr. Adams done this, he would have disposed of the difficulty in regard to the radius vector of Uranus at a single glance. Not having done this, he was staggered by the question propounded by the royal astronomer, and deterred from the prosecution of his enterprise, till the appearance of Le Verrier's paper of June, 1846, encouraged him to resume it. M. Arago thinks he sees in these facts abundant proof that "the work of Mr. Adams was only a rough sketch,-an incomplete trial, in which the author himself, pressed by the difficulty which Mr. Airy had suggested, placed no confidence." The general truth of Mr. Adams' results would hardly justify so sweeping a sentence as this. The subsequent remarks of M. Arago, however, cannot be charged with injustice: "If M. Le Verrier, aside from every consideration of ability, knowledge, and skill, was more fortunate, it was because he completely revised the theory of Uranus before undertaking his principal research; because he introduced into it important terms of which his predecessors had no knowledge; because he rectified, in accordance with his new theory, the differences which had been found between the tables and observation; because the errors which served as the basis of his calculations really existed, while the errors inserted in the Greenwich publications were stained with all the imperfections of Bouvard's tables." In a letter published in the Athenæum, and dated Oct. 15, Prof. Challis considers the part taken by Mr. Adams in the theoretical research for the new planet, as sufficient to justify his proposing a name for it. With Mr. Adams' consent he suggests the name of Oceanus. This assumption of a right which obviously belongs to Le Verrier, strikes M. Arago as the climax of arrogant injustice. He protests against it with great vehemence, and with a tincture of bitterness which shows how keenly sensitive he is to the honor of France, and of French philosophers. Le Verrier waives his right to name the planet in favor of Arago, at whose request he commenced his investigations; and Arago insists on placing the name of the discoverer above the father of Saturn. Pope says, "Superior beings, when of late they saw A mortal man unfold all nature's law, What will they do when they learn that this apotheosis has placed a "glassmaker" at the head of their genealogy?* Dickinson College, January 20th, 1847. Astronomers do not seem inclined to adopt the name Le Verrier for the new planet, but have agreed to call it Neptune. ART. VI.-Atonement as taught by Wesley, Fletcher, Clarke, and Watson, in their Sermons, and other Theological Writings. Published by Lane & Tippett, 200 Mulberry-street, New-York. "GREAT is the mystery of godliness; God was manifest in the flesh." It is sometimes objected to the system of revealed religion, that it contains mysteries, and that this fact is derogatory to its claim of divine authority. The existence of mysteries is admitted; but this, so far from being an objection, is really a confirmation of the divine authenticity of the Bible. The unexplained and insolvable facts of revelation are in proof that man is not its author. Had it originated with man, it would be strange indeed if man could not comprehend it: but there being in the system a disclosure of facts and principles which come not within the natural range of human thought, its claim of inspiration is thereby confirmed. Indeed, we see not how it would be possible for God to make a revelation to the finite mind of man,-of the attributes and perfections of his own infinite character,-of the features of his moral government, and of the plan of salvation through a Redeemer-all which sustain relations to other beings and other worlds, and take hold of the boundless nature of God, of which our knowledge must ever be imperfect-without containing facts and references above the reach of the most lofty human intellect. Abstract these mysteries, and the pages of the Bible will present much less proof than they now do of being written by the finger of God. Apart from the mode of the divine existence, there is no one doctrine of revealed religion involving more of mystery and moral grandeur than the atonement. It has occupied the thoughts and pens of the most profound, and yet its depths remain unfathomed it is the soul and centre of all that is interesting, glorious, and blissful, in religion. Embracing the objects it contemplates, the grounds of its necessity, and the principles on which it proceeds, it is the most benevolent, mysterious, and exalted development of a mysterious and incomprehensible God. Considering men as they are, it need not be a subject of wonder that different and discordant views of atonement should prevail. Interest, prejudice, and corruption, have much influence in the formation of religious opinions. Besides, the practice, which, unfortunately, is too prevalent, of subjecting the doctrines of revelation to the test of human reason, has long been a fruitful source of diversity and error in matters of religion. To men of genius and erudition there is a strong temptation to discard as divine truth what they cannot fully explain; and this tendency is quite apparent in some who claim to be, and are generally acknowledged, evangelical. They seem not to be aware that their aim is to take the exalted facts of revelation out of their proper place, and bring them down to the diminutive standard of their own comprehension. The doctrine of atonement in its nature, objects, and relations to other doctrines of religion, is purely a subject of revelation. He who, with childlike simplicity, takes the Bible for his guide, will not greatly err; but he who discards the Bible only so far as he can conform it to his notions of right reason, or who makes rationalism the basis of his interpretations, will "Find no end in wandering mazes lost." There were no "theories of atonement" during the first two centuries. Not that the immediate successors of the apostles had no definite conceptions of the nature of atonement, but the age of philosophical speculation had not yet commenced in the church. These "fathers" adhered to the simplicity of the Bible, and attempted no nice distinctions or metaphysical statement of the facts and principles involved in this great subject. The history of the various theories taught since theologians began to make atonement a subject of speculation is both curious and instructive. The first that made its appearance after this age was that adopted by Origen, and which subsequently became the prevailing theory of the Greek Church. In substance it was as follows:-The devil, by stratagem and fraud, had managed to get the human race under his control, and held them in absolute dominion. God, being interested in their welfare, sought their deliverance. This he might have effected by violence, but was restrained by considerations of justice. He, therefore, offered Christ as a ransom, which being accepted, the human race was set at liberty. But Satan was deceived in the transaction. For he supposed Christ to be finite: hence, when he proved to be also the Son of God, he was unable to retain him in his power; and, consequently, lost both his captives and the price of their redemption. Another theory-traces of which are found in the writings of Athanasius, and whose influence extended to the twelfth century— attempted to explain the atonement with philosophical and dialectical exactness. In order to this, the judicial word, satisfaction, was adopted by the advocates of this view, and made the basis of their theory. Had they confined themselves to the Scriptural idea of satisfaction, they would not have been misled. But taking their |