Quarterly List of New Books and Pamphlets [pp. 463-470]

1841.] Qi'arter1~ List oj'New Books. 457
as the pages of the Literary and Theological Review amply testify. Hence
his sermons which ably inculcate the doctrines of the reformation, always
have an aspect towards those prevailing errors by which they are most inva
ded in our day. And there is an edge and temper in the weapons with which
he repels them, which renders them absolutely fatal. He exposes with a
master hand the corrupt and pernicious character of those principles, pro
ceedings and attendant religious excitements, which have swept over many
parts of the country, under the different titles of new divinity, new light and
new measures. We can conceive of no better antidote to these corruptions,
than this volume of Sermons. We see not how they could take root on a
soil pre.occupied by the thorough study of such books as this. If any sup
pose that the danger of these things is past, they are entirely misinformed.
The persons who formerly "rode in the whirlwind and directed the storm,"
have indeed had their day: their folly has been made manifest: they have
gone into obscurity, or espoused heresies so gross and palpable, as to cut the
nerve of their influence in all communities pretending to be evangelical. But
their spirit still lives in a host of followers and imitators in various sects, some
of whom have risen to a like sudden celebrity, and will doubtless run an equally ephemeral career. These persons will often spring upon a community, and
raise a ferment by their hot and tumultuous proceedings, before their influence begins to be suspected or feared. And a in moment, all evangelical
churches find an unlooked for irruption made upon themselves, as sudden,
terrific and inesistible as if it had been a burst of thunder. Let none then
cry peace, peace when there is no peace. For sudden destruction cometh as
a whirlwind.
We are constrained in this connezion to notice the perfect agreement b~
tween the New Haven Divinity, and that which gave birth and sustenance
to the wild measures in Western New York. It has always been earnestly
denied by the gentleman at New Haven that the two have any sympathy or
affinity. But we venture to assert that wherever these sermons expose a
prevalent error in regard to depravity or regeneration, a common reader, who
had been accustomed to hear the views advanced by Dr. Taylor's school, and
had never heard of the theology of Western New York, would suppose he
was aiming point-blank at the former. And we venture to assert that the for
mer class would find as much fault with many of the doctrines taught in this
book, as the western ievivalists and for the same reasons. Now we recollect
hearing Dr. Foot on one occasion to speak of the importance of exposing the
errors of the New Haven school. He said however that this was not his
field. He has not paid attention to the particular type which these things
take at New Haven. He had occupied himself as a controversialist almost
entirely with these heresies and disorders, as they developed themselves, where
he had been obliged to meet them, i. e., in Western New York, and he deemed himself more capable of serving God and the church, by confining himself to this field. When therefore he speaks of modern errors in these ser VOL. XIII. NO. 3. 50