Plurality of worlds : or letters, notes and memoranda, philosophical and critical occasioned by 'A series of discourses on the Christian revelation, viewed in connection with the modern astronomy / By Thomas Chalmers, D.D.' [Anon].

  • Maxwell, Alexander (Bookseller), 1776-1849.
Date:
1817
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Plurality of worlds : or letters, notes and memoranda, philosophical and critical occasioned by 'A series of discourses on the Christian revelation, viewed in connection with the modern astronomy / By Thomas Chalmers, D.D.' [Anon]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    naan of mere taste, with the dazzling pictures which he presents to our notice. With the one hand he builds, with the other he pulls down. There is an evident attempt at display ; a sort of embellishment, which is artificial, and directly opposed to the na» ture of his subject(lO). You perceive in it a great want of scriptural accuracy of sentiment, and very little to affect the heart. It is not that rich and powerful eloquence alternately freezing and burning, embodied by the word of life, which carries convic¬ tion to the conscience and touches every feeling and passion of the soul (11.) In scripture illustration he is (10) “ Au milieu dc si grandes verites, un predicateur est- il excusable de ne s’occuper qu’a faire un vain etalage d’elo- cution, a chercher des pensees brillantes, a arrondir des pe- riodes, a entasscr de vaines figures ? Que deviennent cepen- dant cette douleur et cette tristesse dont il doit etre penetre en parlant de tels sujets, et qui devroient ne faire de tout son discours qu’un continuel gemissement ? N’auroit-on pas lieu dc s’indigner s’il se mettoit en peine de montrer de l’esprit, et s’il avoit le loisir de songer & faire le beau parleur, dans un terns ou il ne faut qne tonner, foudroier, et emploier les mouve- mens les plus vifs et les plus animes ?” Rollin, Belles Lettres, tom. 2, p. 376. (11) “ The sublime majesty and royal magnificence of the scripture poems, are above the reach, and beyond the power of all mortal wit. Take the best and liveliest poems of antiquity, and read them as we do the scriptures, in a prose translation, and they are flat and poor. Horace, and Virgil, and Homer, lose their spirit and strength in the transfusion to that degree, that we have hardly patience to read them. But the sacred